Iterative Bragg peak removal on X-ray absorption spectra with automatic intensity correction.

This study introduces a novel iterative Bragg peak removal with automatic intensity correction (IBR-AIC) methodology for X-ray absorption spectroscopy (XAS), specifically addressing the challenge of Bragg peak interference in the analysis of crystalline materials. The approach integrates experimental adjustments and sophisticated post-processing, including an iterative algorithm for robust calculation of the scaling factor of the absorption coefficients and efficient elimination of the Bragg peaks, a common obstacle in accurately interpreting XAS data, particularly in crystalline samples. The method was thoroughly evaluated on dilute catalysts and thin films, with fluorescence mode and large-angle rotation.

Local Environment of Sc and Y Dopant Ions in Aluminum Nitride Thin Films.

The local environments of Sc and Y in predominantly ⟨002⟩ textured, AlDoN (Do = Sc, = 0.25, 0.30 or Y, = 0.

Enhanced Mechanical and Electromechanical Properties of Compositionally Complex Zirconia Zr(GdPrNdSmY)O Ceramics.

Compositionally complex oxides (CCOs) or high-entropy oxides (HEOs) are new multielement oxides with unexplored physical and functional properties. In this work, we report fluorite structure-derived compositionally complex zirconia with composition Zr(GdPrNdSmY)O ( = 0.1 and 0.

Lead-free Zr-doped ceria ceramics with low permittivity displaying giant electrostriction.

Electrostrictors, materials developing mechanical strain proportional to the square of the applied electric field, present many advantages for mechanical actuation as they convert electrical energy into mechanical, but not vice versa. Both high relative permittivity and reliance on Pb as the key component in commercial electrostrictors pose serious practical and health problems. Here we describe a low relative permittivity (<250) ceramic, ZrCeO (x < 0.

The elastic component of anisotropic strain dominates the observed shift in the F Raman mode of anelastic ceria thin films.

Raman spectroscopy is applied for non-destructive characterization of strain in crystalline thin films. The analysis makes use of the numerical value of the mode Grüneisen parameter , which relates the fractional change in the frequency of a Raman-active vibrational mode and the strain-induced fractional change in the unit cell volume. When in-plane, compressive biaxial strain in aliovalent doped CeO-films is relieved by partial substrate removal, the films exhibit values of for the F vibrational mode which are ∼30% of the literature values for bulk ceramics under isostatic stress.