Eur. Phys. J. E (2010) 31: 69-72
https://doi.org/10.1140/epje/i2010-10550-2

Regular Article

Confocal zero-angle dynamic depolarized light scattering

¹ Dipartimento di Fisica, Università di Milano, 20133, Milano, Italy
² Dipartimento di Elettronica, Università di Pavia, 27100, Pavia, Italy

^* e-mail: marco.potenza@unimi.it

Received: 8 October 2009
Revised: 26 November 2009
Accepted: 27 November 2009
Published online: 20 January 2010

Abstract

We present a novel Dynamic Depolarized Scattering method based on a tight confocal, zero scattering angle, heterodyne scheme. The method is highly immune from parasitic multiple-scattering contributions, so that it can operate with non-index-matched samples presenting large turbidity. It provides measurements of both rotational and translational diffusion coefficients, the latter via number fluctuation spectroscopy. In addition, the amplitude ratio between the two baselines for the fast rotational mode and the slow translational mode can be used to determine the particles intrinsic birefringence.