Chemistry, Physics and Technology of Surface

ISSN 2518-1238 (Online), ISSN 2079-1704 (Print)

The aim of this study was to develop a technique to analyze the crystalline and particulate morphology of highly disperse complex metal and metalloid oxides, which include both crystalline and amorphous phases, using X-ray diffraction (XRD) data to compute crystallite size distributions (CSD) compared to the particles size distribution functions estimated from high-resolution transmission electron microscopy (TEM) images treated with specific software. Two versions of the XRD treatment methods were used: (i) full profile analysis (FPA) of whole XRD patterns with a self-consistent regularization (SCR) procedure using models for spherical and lamellar crystallites that allows us to estimate relative contributions of crystallites of different shapes; and (ii) analysis of main pure XRD lines with consideration of corrections on an instrumental line profile and background using a regularization procedure with models of spherical or lamellar crystallites. The XRD and TEM based approaches were tested to analyze the crystalline and particulate morphology of various disperse materials: complex (binary and ternary) fumed oxides with silica/alumina, silica/titania, and alumina/silica/titania including crystalline alumina and titania and amorphous silica; nanocomposites CeO₂–ZrO₂/SiO₂ (10 : 10 : 80 wt.%) and TiO₂–ZrO₂/SiO₂ (10 : 10 : 80 wt.%) including crystalline and amorphous phases and synthesized using a liquid-phase method and fumed silica A–300 as a substrate; and natural clays of complex composition including several crystalline phases. Obtained results show that the developed approaches to analyze the XRD patterns could be effectively used to compute the CSD in parallel with TEM image treatments, using specific software, for a deeper insight into crystalline and particulate morphology of various disperse materials.

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