Retention of the tetragonal phase in pure ZrO2 nanopowders

D.G. LAMAS; A.M. ROSSO; M. SUAREZ ANZORENA; A. FERNÁNDEZ; M.G. BELLINO; N.E. WALSÖE DE RECA; A.F. CRAIEVICH

2004 Activity Report of the Brazilian Synchrotron Light Laboratory

Laboratorio Nacional de Luz Sincrotron (LNLS)

Año: 2005 p. 453 - 453

1518-0204

In this work, we have performed a careful crystallographic study of pure ZrO2 nanopowders using synchrotron radiation XRD in a high-intensity configuration. Our results demonstrate that pure ZrO2 nanopowders with crystallite sizes in the range 5-10 nm exhibit the tetragonal phase, in contradiction with some works reported in the literature, that claimed the retention of the cubic phase for this crystallite size range. In addition, our results indicates that, for decreasing crystallite sizes and reaching values in the range 1.5-2.0 nm, a tetragonal-to-cubic transition occurs.