In-situ Phase Transition Study of Minerals using Micro-focusing Rotating-anode X-ray and 2-Dimensional Area Detector

The increased brightness and focused X-ray beams now available from laboratory X-ray sources facilitates a variety of powder diffraction experiments not practical using conventional in-house sources. Furthermore, the increased availability of 2-dimensional area detectors, along with implementation of improved software and customized sample environmental cells, makes possible new classes of in-situ and time-resolved diffraction experiments. These include phase transitions under variable pressure- and temperature conditions and ion-exchange reactions. Examples of in-situ and time-resolved studies which are presented here include: (1) time-resolved data to evaluate the kinetics and mechanism of ion exchange in mineral natrolite; (2) in-situ dehydration and thermal expansion behaviors of ion-exchanged natrolite; and (3) observations of the phases forming under controlled hydrostatic pressure conditions in ion-exchanged natrolite. Both the quantity and quality of the in-situ diffraction data are such to allow evaluation of the reaction pathway and Rietveld analysis on selected dataset. These laboratory-based in-situ studies will increase the predictability of the follow-up experiments at more specialized beamlines at the synchrotron.