Refining bimodal microstructure of materials with MSTRUCT

Abstract

The possibilities of modelling the diffraction profiles from bimodal microstructure in computer program MSTRUCT are demonstrated on two examples. A special “Double Component” profile effect can be utilized for such problems. At first it was applied to an analysis of a mixture of two nanocrystalline anatase powders with different crystallite sizes and the relative ratio of both components was determined from X-ray diffraction data. In the second case study, diffraction peaks from a pure polycrystalline copper sample treated by equal channel angular pressing were fitted using a two-phase model of large recrystallized defect-free grains and ultrafine crystallites with high dislocation density. The method is shown to be suitable for determination of the relative fraction of the microstructural components as well as other parameters (e.g. dislocation density).