Fig. 2: The compression-rate-dependent structural transitions liquid sulfur at 403 K.
a A ramp compression of liquid sulfur at pressures of 0.05–4.1 GPa in 0.4 s, with a rapid compression rate of ~10 GPa/s. Time-resolved Raman spectra of sulfur collected along the compression pathway. The exposure time is 0.04 s. b A ramp compression of liquid sulfur at pressures of 0.05–4.1 GPa in 8 s, with a much slower compression rate of ~0.05 GPa/s. Time-resolved Raman spectra of sulfur collected along the compression pathway. The exposure time is 0.1 s. SR and SP indicate the integrated area of the Raman signal for the sulfur ring and sulfur chain sections. The gray shaded areas indicate the bending modes of sulfur rings. The remaining bending modes indicated by the red arrows show that, for a brief period just after the pressure reached 4.1 GPa, there are residual S8 rings that have not been converted into polymeric chains. Note that the intensity of the Raman signal is significantly reduced in the amorphous state.
