High-throughput continuous hydrothermal synthesis of an entire nanoceramic phase diagram

Weng, X. and Cockcroft, J.K. and Hyett, G. and Vickers, M. and Boldrin, P. and Tang, C.C. and Thompson, S.P. and Parker, J.E. and Knowles, J.C. and Rehman, I. and Parkin, I. and Evans, J.R.G. and Darr, J.A. (2009) High-throughput continuous hydrothermal synthesis of an entire nanoceramic phase diagram. Journal of Combinatorial Chemistry, 11 (5). pp. 829-834. ISSN 1520-4766

Abstract

A novel High-Throughput Continuous Hydrothermal (HiTCH) flow synthesis reactor was used to make directly and rapidly a 66-sample nanoparticle library (entire phase diagram) of nanocrystalline CexZryY zO2-δ in less than 12 h. High resolution PXRD data were obtained for the entire heat-treated library (at 1000 °C/1 h) in less than a day using the new robotic beamline 111, located at Diamond Light Source (DLS). This allowed Rietveld-quality powder X-ray diffraction (PXRD) data collection of the entire 66-sample library in < 1 day. Consequently, the authors rapidly mapped out phase behavior and sintering behaviors for the entire library. Out of the entire 66-sample heat-treated library, the PXRD data suggests that 43 possess the fluorite structure, of which 30 (out of 36) are ternary compositions. The speed, quantity and quality of data obtained by our new approach, offers an exciting new development which will allow structure-property relationships to be accessed for nanoceramics in much shorter time periods. © 2009 American Chemical Society.