Local structure of the tetragonal phase in nanostructured ZrO2-based materials

L.M. ACUÑA; D.G. LAMAS; R.O. FUENTES; I.O. FÁBREGAS; P.M. ABDALA; M.E. FERNÁNDEZ DE RAPP; N.E. WALSÖE DE RECA; M.C.A. FANTINI; A.F. CRAIEVICH; R.J. PRADO

2005 Activity Report of the Brazilian Synchrotron Light Laboratory

Laboratorio Nacional de Luz Sincrotron (LNLS)

Año: 2006 p. 738 - 738

1518-0204

The coordination of Zr atoms in ZrO2 polymorphs has been studied by several authors. However, contradictory results can be found in the literature. For example, in the case of the tetragonal phase, while several authors accept the eightfold coordination of Zr expected according to the crystal structure of this phase, some works reported sixfold coordination of Zr in CeO2 or Fe-doped ZrO2 nanocrystals. In this work, we studied the local structure around Zr atoms in pure or lightly Y2O3-doped ZrO2 nanopowders exhibiting the tetragonal phase. We investigated the effect of the crystallite size and dopant concentration.