Sumitomo Rubber Industries (SRI), in collaboration mainly with Makina Saito, Associate Professor at Tohoku University; Takaki Hatsui, Group Director at RIKEN; and Yoshitaka Yoda, Senior Scientist at the Japan Synchrotron Radiation Research Institute, has developed a new synchrotron radiation technique capable of measuring atomic, molecular, and nanostructure motion in a wide time domain including 1 nanosecond. Through this study, SRI will pursue the development of tires with high strength and excellent wear resistance.

A conceptual diagram of synchrotron radiation technique capable of measuring atomic, molecular, and nanostructure motion in a wide time domain ©️Makina Saito

Sumitomo Rubber Industries conducted a joint study aimed at improving the wear resistance of tires with Associate Professor Makina Saito of Tohoku University. Conventional measuring techniques were only able to measure atomic/molecular motion in rubber in a time domain of 10 to 1000 nanoseconds. To improve wear resistance, SRI needed to examine atomic/molecular motion in rubber more closely in a shorter time domain.

The new synchrotron radiation technique is capable of measuring 0.1- to 100-nanosecond motion. Combining the innovative technique with conventional processes has made it possible to measure atomic or molecular motion in a wide time domain.

It has been developed using SPring-8, a large synchrotron radiation facility, for the first time. Furthermore, the use of CITIUS, the latest two-dimensional x-ray camera, enabled the measurement not only of the timescale of a moving object but of its spatial scale at the same time.

The team succeeded in measuring molecular chain motion in rubber in a wide time domain of 0.1 to 100 nanoseconds by applying the developed technique to rubber material. A paper on the work is published in the journal Physical Review Letters.

This study was carried out under CREST (Core Research for Evolutionary Science and Technology), one of the Strategic Basic Research Programs administered by the Japan Science and Technology Agency with the aim of promoting unique and world-class studies.

Resources

• M. Saito, et al., “Broadband Quasielastic Scattering Spectroscopy Using a Multiline Frequency Comblike Spectrum in the Hard X-Ray Region” Phys. Rev. Lett. (2024), doi: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.132.256901