@article{188, keywords = {ixs, paper}, author = {Simo Huotari and Marco Cazzaniga and Hans-Christian Weissker and Tuomas Pylkkänen and Harald Müller and Lucia Reining and G Onida and Giulio Monaco}, title = {Dynamical response function in sodium studied by inelastic x-ray scattering spectroscopy}, abstract = {We present the dynamic structure factor S(Q,ω) of Na valence electrons in the range of momentum transfer 0.5kF < Q < 2.4kF and energy transfer 3 eV < ω < 30 eV determined by inelastic x-ray scattering spectroscopy. In this range, we observe how the collective plasmon excitations decay into the single-particle excitation continuum. We compare the results to calculations using time-dependent density-functional theory with different approximations. The failure of both random-phase approximation and time-dependent local-density approximation (TDLDA) is shown to become important at kF < Q < 2.4kF , while TDLDA with an additional inclusion of quasiparticle lifetime effects reproduces the experimental spectra well. The experimental valenceelectron response reaches the single-particle spectrum surprisingly early, at Q ≈ 1.5kF . This is manifested both in the spectral shape and the peak dispersion. The experimental spectra are nearly free of any fine structure, confirming that the peak-shoulder structure observed in many other materials is due to band-structure effects, which turn out to be negligible in Na.}, year = {2011}, journal = {Phys. Rev. B}, volume = {84}, pages = {075108}, month = {Aug}, publisher = {American Physical Society}, url = {http://link.aps.org/doi/10.1103/PhysRevB.84.075108}, doi = {10.1103/PhysRevB.84.075108}, }