Nim Benshalom
Marie Curie Postdoctoral Fellow, Inorganic Chemistry Laboratory, University of Oxford
Materials physicist, experienced in spectroscopy and interferometry, with a budding predilection for theoretical modelling. I’m interested in how different excitations in the solid state lead to light scattering phenomena, and what that reveals about the many-body nature of the system.
About
I am a postdoctoral researcher in the Inorganic Chemistry Laboratory at Oxford, where I explore light scattering phenomena in disordered materials with Prof. Andrew Goodwin. I am also Junior Research Fellow at Corpus Christi College, where I tutor Atomic and Condensed Matter Physics.
Before Oxford, I completed my PhD at the Weizmann Institute of Science, studying lattice dynamics through Raman spectroscopy, and earned my Master’s at Tel Aviv University, working on interferometric quantum weak measurements. To add a little drama, I also studied screenplay writing at the Sam Spiegel Film School in Jerusalem.
Research & Teaching
Few disciplines can boast as many Nobel Prizes as crystallography. From the discovery of X-ray diffraction in 1912, to Oxford’s own Dorothy Hodgkin’s work on penicillin (1945), the elucidation of DNA’s double helix (1953), and the development of neutron scattering (1948), the field has shaped modern science.
I use X-ray radiation to investigate how magnetic properties in crystals change with temperature. While diffraction techniques are typically applied to probe the equilibrium, or “static,” structure of a crystal, they can also reveal deviations from the average, so long as those deviations are not random. This is precisely the case for temperature-induced vibrations, which take on a wave-like form. In my research, I am working to measure, for the first time, the interaction between magnetic and structural waves using X-rays.
Although my work is fundamental in nature, understanding temperature-dependent magnetism has immediate implications: it may enable control over magnetic phase transitions and help pave the way for new materials in information storage technologies.
Alongside research, I currently tutor condensed matter physics at college and have previously taught supplementary quantum mechanics in the chemistry department. I am also committed to public engagement with science, having worked at the Jerusalem Science Museum and the Davidson Institute of Science Education.
Key words
- Lattice dynamics
- Total scattering
- Magnon–phonon interaction
- Organic semiconductors
- Spin dynamics
- Raman spectroscopy
- Ionic conductivity
- Classical molecular dynamics
Publications
A complete and current list is kept at 0000-0002-1668-6030
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2026
Phonon–phonon interactions and incipient dynamic reordering in monoclinic BiVO4
The Journal of Physical Chemistry Letters under review
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2025
Ab initio theory of the non-resonant Raman effect in crystals at finite temperature in comparison to experiment: the examples of GaN and BaZrS3
arXiv preprint
arXiv:2412.17711 -
2024
Is ortho-terphenyl a rigid glass former?
The Journal of Physical Chemistry Letters 15, 7020–7027
10.1021/acs.jpclett.4c01217 -
2023
Phonon–phonon interactions in the polarization dependence of Raman scattering
Journal of Physical Chemistry C 127, 18099–18106
10.1021/acs.jpcc.3c03850 -
2023
The disorder origin of Raman scattering in perovskite single crystals
Physical Review Materials 7, 044602
10.1103/PhysRevMaterials.7.044602 -
2022
Dielectric response of rock-salt crystals at finite temperatures from first principles
Physical Review Materials 6, 033607
10.1103/PhysRevMaterials.6.033607 -
2022
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2019
Universality of local weak interactions and its application for interferometric alignment
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 116, 2881–2890
10.1073/pnas.1812970116
* Equal contribution.
Code
Under construction
Diatribes
Under construction
Contact
- nim.benshalom@chem.ox.ac.uk
- Inorganic Chemistry Laboratory, Oxford, UK OX1 3QR
- Research group — Goodwin Group, Oxford
- College — Corpus Christi College
- Google Scholar — citation profile
- ORCID — 0000-0002-1668-6030