Wide-angle powder XRD patterns

Figure 3.4 (a) Wide-angle powder XRD patterns of mesoporous perovskite oxides synthesized using ordered mesoporous KIT-6 aged at 100°C as the hard template. The lowest curve corresponds to the LaMnOs perovskite synthesized without using citric acid. 

Powder XRD is one of the most widely used techniques to characterize ceramics. The material is in the form of a powder so that the grains will be present in all possible orientations so that all d spacings, or 0 values, will appear in one pattern. The classical powder pattern was recorded on photographic film. Now the data are in the form of a plot (known as a diffractogram) of counts or intensity versus scattering angle (20) as shown in Figure 10.30. A computer that contains the entire PDF is usually used for peak identification. In many examples you will see in the literature phase identihcation is the extent to which powder XRD is used. This ability alone makes it a powerful and indispensable tool for the ceramist. In a multiphase material the relative amounts of each phase can be determined from the peak areas. 

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