Measurement of infrared absorptivities and line shapes and the distortion of anvils in diamond-anvil cells

The infrared transmission of diamond and other transparent anvil apparatuses that contain absorbing samples, has been calculated as a function of frequency for planar anvils that are inclined to one another or that are distorted into parabolic shapes. At frequencies where the samples are completely transparent, the height of the interference fringes decreases with increase of frequency at nearly the same rate for both parabolically distorted and inclined anvils for which the maximum difference in optical path length of the sample is the same. Hence, the distortion of anvils in a typical experimental configuration have been measured up to a mean pressure on the anvil faces of 60 kbar. They are consistent with the predictions of elasticity theory that distortions occur at the rate of about 20 μm in 500 kbar. The predicted effect of such distortions on the absorbance, integrated area, and time autocorrelation function of the dipole moment is insignificant in a well-designed experiment, and so all these properties can now be measured accurately at high pressures.