TY - JOUR A1 - Chambers, M. S. A1 - Hunter, R. D. A1 - Hollamby, M. J. A1 - Pauw, Brian Richard A1 - Smith, A. J. A1 - Snow, T. A1 - Danks, A. E. A1 - Schnepp, Z. T1 - In Situ and Ex Situ X‑ray Diffraction and Small-Angle X‑ray Scattering Investigations of the Sol−Gel Synthesis of Fe3N and Fe3C N2 - Iron nitride (Fe3N) and iron carbide (Fe3C) nanoparticles can be prepared via sol−gel synthesis. While sol−gel methods are simple, it can be difficult to control the crystalline composition, i.e., to achieve a Rietveld-pure product. In a previous in situ synchrotron study of the sol−gel synthesis of Fe3N/Fe3C, we showed that the reaction proceeds as follows: Fe3O4 → FeOx → Fe3N → Fe3C. There was considerable overlap between the different phases, but we were unable to ascertain whether this was due to the experimental setup (side-on heating of a quartz capillary which could lead to thermal gradients) or whether individual particle reactions proceed at different rates. In this paper, we use in situ wide- and small-angle X-ray scattering (wide-angle X-ray scattering (WAXS) and small-angle X-ray scattering (SAXS)) to demonstrate that the overlapping phases are indeed due to variable reaction rates. While the initial oxide nanoparticles have a small range of diameters, the size range expands considerably and very rapidly during the oxide−nitride transition. This has implications for the isolation of Rietveld-pure Fe3N, and in an extensive laboratory study, we were indeed unable to isolate phasepure Fe3N. However, we made the surprising discovery that Rietveld-pure Fe3C nanoparticles can be produced at 500 °C with a sufficient furnace dwell time. This is considerably lower than the previous reports of the sol−gel synthesis of Fe3C nanoparticles. KW - Small-angle X-ray Scattering KW - SAXS KW - Diffraction KW - XRD KW - Scattering KW - Sol-gel KW - Iron nitride KW - Nanoparticles KW - Iron carbide KW - Catalyst KW - In-situ KW - Ex-situ KW - Synthesis KW - Synchrotron PY - 2022 UR - https://nbn-resolving.org/urn:nbn:de:kobv:b43-548226 DO - https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.inorgchem.1c03442 VL - 61 IS - 18 SP - 6742 EP - 6749 PB - ACS Publications CY - Washington AN - OPUS4-54822 LA - eng AD - Bundesanstalt fuer Materialforschung und -pruefung (BAM), Berlin, Germany ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Hayward, E. C. A1 - Smales, Glen Jacob A1 - Pauw, Brian Richard A1 - Takeguchi, M. A1 - Kulak, A. A1 - Hunter, R. D. A1 - Schnepp, Z. T1 - The effect of catalyst precursors on the mechanism of iron-catalysed graphitization of cellulose N2 - Iron-catalysed graphitization of biomass is a simple and sustainable route to carbons with high graphitic content. It uses abundant precursors and moderate processing temperatures and generates carbons with high porosity. Recently, it has been demonstrated that the choice of biomass precursor can have a significant impact on the textural and compositional properties of the resulting carbon. In this paper, we demonstrate that the choice of catalyst is also critical to the carbon structure. Aqueous iron(III) nitrate and iron(III) chloride convert cellulose to carbons with very different textural properties. This is due to the choice of iron catalyst changing the mechanism of cellulose decomposition and also the nature of the active graphitization catalyst. KW - Catalyst KW - Carbon materials KW - Cellulose KW - Small-angle scattering KW - Green energy KW - Graphitic carbon KW - Green synthesis PY - 2024 UR - https://nbn-resolving.org/urn:nbn:de:kobv:b43-614800 DO - https://doi.org/10.1039/D4SU00365A SP - 1 EP - 10 PB - Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC) AN - OPUS4-61480 LA - eng AD - Bundesanstalt fuer Materialforschung und -pruefung (BAM), Berlin, Germany ER -