The behaviour of large and complex aggregations of elementary particles or atoms cannot be understood in terms of a simple extrapolation of the properties of a few particles. Instead, at each level of complexity, entirely new properties appear and understanding the new behaviours requires fundamental analysis. The parallels between high energy physics and condensed matter physics is especially strong in the studies of magnetism and the strong correlations between atoms. Here particle physics merges with condensed matter theory. A single crystal mosaic of CuGeO 3 .
Great effort is spent in growing and assembling such complex arrays of delicate crystals.
Quantum mechanics gives the fundamental rules of how atoms interact, and the richest set of rules are encapsulated in magnetism. Studying model magnetic systems provides insight into the complex rules that govern everyday behaviour. The huge advantage of the MAPS instrument is the collection of a 3-dimension volume of data that reveals the whole picture of the atomic correlations in one snapshot with unprecedented detail. The 500Mbytes of data collected per measurement are analysed by powerful visualisation and other software that provides experimenters with unprecedented freedom to group individual pixels together to optimise the instrument s resolution for their particular experiment. It is almost as though they are reconstructing the instrument for every new measurement, and furthermore they can continue to do this even after the actual data collection has ceased.