Single-crystal elastic moduli, anisotropy, and the B1–B2 phase transition of NaCl at high pressures

Pressure dependences of the highest and lowest possible longitudinal sound velocities in single crystals of the B1 and B2 phases of NaCl were extracted from examination of their polycrystalline samples using the technique of time-domain Brillouin scattering. Based on the data collected up to 41 GPa, we largely extended the pressure range where single-crystal elastic moduli, Cij(P), and elastic anisotropy of the two cubic phases are measured, especially the experimental data for the B2 phase formed upon the reconstructive phase transition. The B1 phase of NaCl exhibits strong and growing anisotropy with increasing pressure, while that of the B2 phase is much weaker. Comparing with the previous experimental Cij(P) of other compounds exhibiting or expected to exhibit the B1–B2 phase transition, such as CaO, MgO, and (Mg1−x, Fex)O, we concluded that the transition is initiated by the shear instability due to violation of the Born stability criterion [C44(P)–P] > 0 and predicted the presently-not-verified transition pressures for MgO and (Mg1−x, Fex)O.