MOMENTUM DISTRIBUTION AND FINAL-STATE EFFECTS IN LIQUID NEON

We report high precision inelastic neutron scattering measurements in liquid Neon at a temperature of 25.8 K and saturated vapour pressure. The data covers a wide range of energy and momentum transfer (2 Angstr om(-1) less than or equal to Q less than or equal to 13 Angstrom(-1)). The atomic momentum distribution, n(p), and final state effects (FSE) can be readily extracted from this intermediate wavevector transfer d ata provided a suitable method of analysis is used. We find that the m omentum distribution in liquid Neon is marginally sharper than a Gauss ian and that final state effects contribute predominantly an antisymme tric component to the the dynamic structure factor. The width of n(p) and the kinetic energy are increased by 37% above the classical values due to quantum effects. The experimental results are in agreement wit h theoretical values obtained by a Path Integral Monte Carlo simulatio n.