Positron annihilation studies on bulk metallic glass and high intensity positron beam developments

Positron annihilation spectroscopy is an ideal probe to examine atomic scale open-volume regions in materials. Below, we summarize the recent results on studies of open-volume regions of a multicomponent Zr-Ti-Ni-Cu-Be bulk metallic glass. Our studies establish two types of open-volume regions, one group that is too shallow to trap positrons at room temperature and becomes effective only at low temperatures and the other group that localizes positrons at room temperature and is large enough to accommodate hydrogen. The second half of the paper will concentrate on the high intensity positron program at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. A new positron production target is under development and we are constructing two experimental end stations to accommodate a pulsed positron microprobe and an experiment on positron diffraction and holography. Important design considerations of these experiments will be described. (author)