A simple device for measuring thermal deformations in two-dimensional samples cooled to liquid nitrogen temperatures is described. The measurement consists of adding liquid nitrogen to a transparent quartz tray, and then scanning the sample from the bottom with a flatbed scanner. As a test of the device, the thermal contraction of aluminum from room temperature to 77 K is measured. The application of Gruneisen's approximation leads to good agreement between the calculated and tabulated contraction percentages. (c) 2005 American Association of Physics Teachers.
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