New high temperature gas flow cell developed at ISIS

Abstract

A flow-through quartz gas cell, together with a gas flow control and monitoring system, has been designed and constructed at ISIS. This equipment allows neutron powder diffraction data to be collected on samples at temperatures up to around 1300 K when exposed to user chosen mixtures of O2, Ar, CO2, and CO. By exploiting the sensitivity of neutrons to the presence of light atoms such as oxygen, it is possible to probe the crystal structure of oxide materials as a function of oxygen partial pressures down to log 10p(O2) of about -20. The resultant structural information can then be correlated with the bulk properties of the materials, whose research and technological interests lie in fields such as energy production, storage materials, catalysis, and earth science.