Physics of Debye-Waller Factors

Abstract

This note has no new results and is therefore not intended to be submitted to a "research" journal in the foreseeable future, but to be available to the numerous individuals who are interested in this issue. The Debye-Waller factor is the ratio of the coherent scattering or absorption cross section of a photon or electron by particles bound in a complex system to the value for the same process on an analgous free particle. It is often interpreted also as the probability of the coherent process, normalized to unity, with the difference between unity and the Debye Waller factor interpreted as the probability of incoherent processes. The Debye-Waller factor is then interpreted as a measure of decoherence. The breakdown of this description for a test particle which cannot give or lose energy is not generally appreciated. Prime examples are: Bragg scattering, the Mössbauer effect and related phenomena at zero temperature. The physics of the change in the interpretation of the Debye-Waller factor is summarized here in a hopefully pedagogical manner.