Calcination treatment involves some initial reaction between the constituent powders. and can also involve reducing some carbonates to oxides, and reducing some oxides to sub-oxides. Whenever we mix some oxides and calcine them at some convenient temperature, we will find the calcined product is slightly fused or becomes hard. It means some reaction has occurred, and need not be single phase formation always. Beause many a times you have to further heat treat the powders (sintering) for compaction and final single phase formation.

Annealing does not involve any phase change, or any chemical reaction producing new reaction products. However in many cases when we try to make nano particles by chemical methods involving organic compounds (like fuels in sol gel autocombustion method)at very low temperatures (e.g.

Thank you so much Dr Sreenivas Sir for the nice explanation.

Sir, in my case synthesis method is co-precipitation method and got the pure crystalline phase (XRD) meaning a complete reaction (also not required for other unwanted by-products). But, when I read the definition of these terms, their functions and purpose and compared to mine, I got confused. Annealing is mostly found to be defined in metallurgy, for removing internal stress and dislocations etc for improving the properties. Also, confusion arises when it is found interchangeably used in some similar reported literature.

Thanks for the justification.

With best regards

As described by others calcinations and annealing both process are related to the heat treatment of ceramics with little difference. After mixing or milling of oxides powders, ceramic bodies were calcined in granulated powder form. During the calcination step the solid state reaction takes place between the constituents resulting in the desired phase. Proper calcinations at the right temperature are therefore necessary to obtain the best electrical and mechanical properties. Because calcinations of lead based, bismuth based materials at high temperature could lead to lead and bismuth loss, resulting in detrimental effects on the electrical properties.

Annealing related with the removal of stress and strain in the material.

Thank you Dr Ajeet for the kind contribution.

With best regards

Thank you so much Dr Alex for sharing an additional information that is concept of magnetic annealing.

With best regards

Questions on ResearchGate related to your topic - you may see the expert comments:

https://www.researchgate.net/post/What_is_the_difference_between_sintering_and_calcination

https://www.researchgate.net/post/What_is_the_difference_between_annealing_calcination_and_sintering

https://www.researchgate.net/post/What_is_the_difference_between_Annealing_Calcination_and_Sintering_process

https://www.researchgate.net/post/What_is_the_difference_between_annealing_sintering_and_calcination

Regards

Thank you Dr Asit sir for adding the relevant discussions.

With best regards

The calcination and annealing process are both belonging to heat treatment process. Calcination process used to treat the mixing powder to get the desired phase. However the annealing process used to remove the stress and strain from the materials.