SEM micrograph of doped Barium Titanate ceramics had certain white spots on the grains? What can be the possible reason for such white spots?
Hi Preeti, great image!
In all fairness, I haven't directly worked with BaTiO3, nor do I have access to bibliography at the moment. This being said, I have worked with other perosvkite compositions and most likely this is one of the following things:
1. partial decomposition of your material during heat treatment;
2. the metal particles deposited during SEM sample preparation, usually Au or Pt.
3. Impurities on your furnace that condensed on your sample surface during furnace cooling.
You can easily check which one it is by performing a spot EDS analysis on any of those particles.
It depends on electron registered. If this is back scattered electrons you see the so-called Z-contrast: electron scattering as a function of the atomic number. In this case white spots on the grain most probably Ba related phase (Ba oxide), like element with highest Z and as a consequence, highest scattering coefficient for electrons.
In the case of secondary electron image, the spots most probably corresponds to surface relief, and, but not evidently, to another phase.
Thanks Daniel Marinha.
I think metal particles deposited during SEM sample preparation, usually Au or Pt might not be responsible for these spots as their particle size are of the order of nanometres and here scale in SEM micrographs is in micrometres.
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