I have SEM/EDX parameters corresponding to a cementitous material. In order to help identify the different species, scatter plots representing Si/Ca vs Al/Ca are common (also S/Ca vs Al/Ca).
I would like to know where those ratios come from; I initially believed they would be atomic% values, but the results make no sense. The parameters I have measured are:
- Apparent concentration
- Intensity correlation
- Weight%
- Atomic%
- Compound% (oxides)
- Number of ions
I assume Compound% is out of the question and, since the calculated Atomic% ratios are much higher than those found in the literature (tipically, between 0 and 1), I believe it would have to be one of the first three; presumably, Weight%.
Would you be so kind to provide some insight on the matter, so that I can fully understand what I need to do?
Thank you.
Can you please post what kind of machine and software you are using? Otherwise I don't see much of a chance for a helpful answer.
The hydrated phases form (Morphology) are detected by SEM and these are verified by EDS as a elemental analysis of that area.
Jürgen Weippert Thanks for your answer. The machine is a FEI Inspect S50, the software is included with it. I did not use it myself, I only processed the results. The ratio calculations were done with Excel, simply by dividing both Atomic percentages for each case.
After a thorough search, I found an article where it finally specified that the ratios were, indeed, calculated with normalised %atomic results. In my case, as I later discovered, many of these calculations made no sense since I had a mixture of different components close enough for the spot size to be unable to focus on a single one, and therefore was getting unusually high amounts of some elements.
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