SYNCHROTRON-RADIATION DIFFRACTION STUDIES OF MAGNETIC-MATERIALS

Since the advent of high brilliance synchrotron radiation sources, mag netic X-ray diffraction has become a standard microscopic probe for th e investigation of magnetic structures, magnetic phase transitions and magnetic disorder phenomena. Modern experiments highlight the complem entarity of this new probe to the standard neutron diffraction techniq ue by taking advantage of the high momentum space resolution, the elem ent sensitivity, the possibility to separate spin- and orbital contrib utions etc. In this paper we present selected experiments performed at HASYLAB which exemplify the present possibilities of resonant and non -resonant magnetic X-ray diffraction.