Dear colleagues,
I analyzed my material using XRD analysis and the material has shown amorphous behavior , how can I specify the composition of the material is there any extra analysis I can make?
Thanks
You can determine the elemental composition of an amorphous material in several ways: optical spectrometry, X-ray spectrometry and energy-dispersive X-ray microanalysis (EDX)
Dear Huda M.H ,
Maybe you can check transmittance spectra or absorbance results with the literature. if your material is thin-film try to calculate the band gap via absorbance.
Dear Huda M.H,
If you want to determine the carbon content in your material, you can do the gravimetry: determine the weight loss after burning the material in air. If you make gravimetry in argon and in air, and then compare their results, then the carbon content can be determined with good accuracy.
Dear Huda M.H,
You didn't mentioned clearly. Which type of composition you needs (phase composition or elemental composition). To determine the elemental composition you can use EDX and FTIR Spectroscopy and to know the phase composition you can use FL emission spectroscopy other XRD.
Best of luck
Dear Huda M.H ,
The elemental composition can be obtained by XRF, EDS, or traditional chemical analysis sequence in a broad sense.
Another point is to obtain the phase components of the unknown sample. That would be much complicated; only specific methods like PDF (Pair Distribution Function), the radial distribution may help in a completely unknown amorphous phase or phases mixture.
Molecular methods, such as UV-VIS and IR, can be used, as already pointed out; however, they have chemical function dependency. They only probe the chemical functions and their associations in the sample. When some other information is already available, the chemical composition may be inferred, usually by comparison to standards from a specific databank.
Nevertheless, for entirely unknown samples, those molecular methods are of little help. You may identify some oxide, nitride, carboxyl band no related to any specific chemical structure, considering a pure amorphous phase.
Shifts to any specific wavelength may help in the identification; however, only associated with complementary information; the shifts may result from impurities, structure distortions, a solvent or atoms inclusions, and a sort of other physical-chemical effects.
I suggest contacting some institutions nearby, ask for some cooperation, and have the XRF or EDS from the unknown sample.
By now, due to the sanitary conditions, it may not be so easy. However, you will not lose your time playing around and finishing with inconclusive data.
Best regards
WNM
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