Nanostructured ceria: a comparative study from X‐ray diffraction, Raman spectroscopy and BET specific surface measurements

Abstract

Abstract We present a comparative study of nanostructured materials, based on three experimental analyses allowing determination of crystallite sizes or specific surfaces: each of these analyses, X‐ray diffraction profile analyses (XRD), Raman spectroscopy and Brunauer–Emmett–Teller (BET) gas adsorption technique, should deliver nanoparticle size determination from a specific modelling approach. These three experimental techniques were used to correlate specific surfaces to grain sizes, in the case of nanostructured powders of cerium dioxide, CeO 2 . Ceria powders were first elaborated by a sol–gel method and then subjected to various heat treatments: the resulting sizes calculated from these XRD, Raman and BET techniques were compared and discussed. Nanocrystal sizes were finally correlated to crystal lattice parameters and Raman frequency. (© 2008 WILEY‐VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim)