Analytical Applications of DTA

Qualitative identification of materials is done by comparing the DTA of the sample to DTA thermal curves of known materials. DTA thermal curves serve as fingerprints for materials. 

Theoretically, the area under each DTA peak should be proportional to the enthalpy change for the process that gave rise to the peak. Unfortunately, in a traditional simple DTA, there are many factors that are not compensated for. For example, DTA response generally decreases as the temperature increases. This makes the area under the peaks unreliable for enthalpy measurements unless the DTA has been calibrated in the 

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