Powder Diffraction and Rietveld Refinement School 2010

点击翻译按钮获取中文摘要

Many of the technological advances that we take for granted in modern life have relied on scientists producing new functional materials with exploitable properties. Examples include the optical materials used in modern displays, the magnetic materials that lie at the heart of data storage in our computers, the catalysts that are used to produce the fuels that society depends on today and the materials that will underpin developments in alternative fuels for the future. The key to understanding all functional materials is to understand their structure at the atomic level - it is the specific arrangement of atoms that gives rise to specific properties. One of the major techniques used to determine the structures of functional materials is powder diffraction. In this technique the directions in which beams of X-rays or neutrons are scattered from a polycrystalline sample and the intensities of these diffracted beams gives the structural information. One of the main techniques required to analyse powder diffraction data is Rietveld refinement. Here one compares the powder diffraction pattern calculated from a structural model with experimental data, and uses a minimisation technique to adjust various parameters of the model (including the atomic arrangement) to get the best possible agreement. This proposal aims to secure funding to train 40 PhD students in this important technique. The training they receive will help them in their research endeavours.