This page is divided into five sections: Local Resources for Lab Users (a
section), Crystallography and X-Ray Diffraction Tutorials, Radiation Safety
Information and Tutorials, Crystallography and XRD Links, and Links to Vendor
Web Sites. Some documents require the use of Adobe Acrobat Reader which may
be downloaded free from Adobe
Corporation.
Note: For ease in reading, navigating and printing pages linked here,
each of the links below will open in a new web browser window. To get back to
this links page when you are done, just close your browser window and you will
find this one below it.
The Windows Help file information accessible from the operator's console
in Jade 6.5 converted into Acrobat PDF files with a Web-page index. Jade 6.5
is an incredibly powerful program, but a difficult one to learn about without
some significant "offline" study. This is provided for that purpose.
This is not openly acessible to users outside of
our department. To access this index and the files you must enter
your E&PS network account username and password when you click on the
link.
Adobe Acrobat PDF copy of the step-by-step "cookbook" for using
the Scintag PAD V system in our laboratory, revised with information for the
newest DataScan 4 version installed in April, 2005.
Adobe Acrobat PDF document that explains how to use Yahoo's online calendar
system to schedule the Scintag PAD V diffractometer for use. The
password for the account must be obtained personally (or via Email) from Jim
Connolly.
Every other "odd" year in the Spring we offer a 3 credit course
that is an introduction to XRD for students who plan to use the laboratory
or just want to learn how to do X-ray powder diffraction. This course page
may be used to link to course materials (primarily Acrobat PDF documents)
for lab users who want to improve their XRD skills.
The BICO Jaw crusher is used to reduce rock specimens from fist-sized to
few-mm-sized granules. This Adobe Acrobat PDF document explains how to use
it.
The SPEX Shatterbox is used to reduce coarsely ground (few-mm-sized) granules
to a fine powder for chemical analysis or XRD. This Adobe Acrobat documents
explains its use in detail, and includes tables of maximum and minimum amounts
of material used in the different size and type of shatterbox containers.
This equipment is located in the Geochemistry lab (Rm 213) in Northrop Hall
and acces is controlled by Dr. Abdul Mehdi-Ali (mehdiali@unm.edu -- Phone
277-1637)
The Micro-Rapid Mill is an automated agate mortar and pestle system that
can be used to reduce powders to under 10 microns by non-percussive grinding
under water, alcohol or acetone. While this Adobe Acrobat documents
explains its use in detail, to avoid damage to the equipment or your sample,
it should not be used without personal one-on-one training from the Lab manager.
Located in the XRD Lab (Room B-25 of Northrop Hall).
Excellent interactive tutorial on all aspects of diffraction phenomena,
with a section on XRD. Produced by a non-profit consortium of Materials Science
departments in Universities in the UK. Highly recommended.
Very mathematical tutorial from The University of Würtzberg in Germany
on the theoretical basis of crystallography and crystal physics in the context
of X-ray Diffraction processes. Good illustrations show how structural variations
and specimen differences are manifested in the resultant data.
An introductory tutorial from Scintag (the producers of our diffractometer)
is a good basic introduction to Bragg diffraction and powder diffractometry,
and some of the advanced capabilities of XRD as an analytical technique.
U. S. Geological Survey Open-File Report 01-041 is an introduction to X-ray
diffraction primarily concerned with the analysis of clay minerals. Contains
an intro to XRD and very extensive specimen preparation procedures for laboratory
analysis.
This introduction to Braggs Law Diffraction features a Java applet which
simulates coherent and incoherent scattering. The user specifies the incident
wavelength (lamda), d-spacing (distance), and incident angle (theta) and the
simulator shows the coherence (or lack of coherence) of the diffracted beam
as a detector intensity.
The International Union of Crystallographers has put together an excellent
set of online tutorials for Diffraction and Crystallography which run from
very basic to very advanced.
A comprehensive and somewhat advanced (and frequently very mathematical)
online tutorial crystallography tutorial from Lawrence Livermore National
Lab. The emphasis is on characterization of organic molecules by single crystal
techniques but the information is generally applicable to all types of X-ray
crystallography.
This is comprehensive online tutorial about the field of X-ray radiology.
While it contains nothing about x-ray diffraction, it includes excellent sections
aboutthe generation of x-rays and their interaction with matter. The tutorial
makes extensive use of very nifty Java aplets (usually requiring the additon
of Sun Java 2 software to your system). Produced by the North Central Collaboration
for Education in Nondestructive Testing, a joint project of four midwest colleges
and Iowa State University.
The classic 1973 paper by Jenkins and Haas is a must-read for anyone who
wants to understand the hazards associated with XRD and what to do to mitigate
them in the lab.
Up until very recently, this link went to a publicly accessible tutorial
concerned with radiation safety for X-ray Diffraction users produced by the
University of Illinois, Champaign Urbana, Radiation Safety Office. Access
(for some reason unknown to me) has recently been restricted to UIC personnel
by username/password login, making it inaccessable to outside users. This
no longer a public resource.
A very extensive set of links which is slanted towards the analysis of clay minerals but also includes lots of more general crystallography, crystal chemistry, X-ray diffraction links and geological links. There are links to some great Earth Science sites here (and Dilbert too). Maintained by Steve Chipera of Los Alamos National Lab.
Online versions of all journals published by the International Union for
Crystallography. Journals of interest include Applied Crystallography, Crystal
Structure Communications, and Foundations of Crystallography. Some articles
from the current issues may be available online, but access to more than short
summaries reqiures and online subscription.
An independently maintained site sponsored by a number of XRD vendors, which provides up-to-date links, news and invited technical articles concerned with X-ray diffraction and other types of X-ray imaging.
Scintag, Inc., the manufacturer of our diffractometer, no longer exists.
After several purchases and corporate aquisitions Scintag has disappeared
into ThermoARL and the diffractometer is in what was the former ARL Swiss
facility. I have left this link here as a curiosity.
Siemens Analytical XRD division was acquired by Bruker, and spun off as
it's own division, Bruker-AXS. Web site does not contain a lot of useful links,
aside from recent company news and contact telephone numbers for sales and
service.
Anyone who has and has used a Scintag system will tell you how solid and
reliable they are and how difficult it is to get
them repaired on the rare occasions when they break. These guys are the Scintag
rescue crew. Compass Engineering was formed by the former head of Thermo's
service group in the U.S. and includes many engineers who worked for Scintag
before it was acquired (absorbed?, consumed?, etc.)
by Thermo. An invaluable very professional resource for folks who like their
Scintag systems and want to keep them functioning.
INEL manufacturers unique very large aperture (90-120 degrees) curved position-sensitive
detectors and associated electronics enabling the creation of diffractometers
with extremely rapid data collection capabilities and virtually no moving
parts. They also make a line of goniometers and diffractometer systems that
incorporate these innovative detectors, or can work with clients to adapt
their detectors to existing diffractometer systems. .
PANalytical is the new incarnation of technology giant Philips' XRD division.
They still make some of the best X-ray tubes around and have been doing it
for a long time, and their systems are considered by most to be the most reliable
and well supported around. This site has information about products, contacts,
training courses available, and company news releases, but little in the way
of other useful links outside the company.
Rigaku primarily makes XRF and XRD systems. They have a variety of systems
available for powder, thin film and single crystal XRD. Their inexpensive
Miniflex desktop-sized system is a fast and reliable machine for quickly analyizing
powders where very high-resolution data are not required. While most of the
site is concerned with product information and company contacts, the Rigaku
Journal is contains many useful technical articles about XRD and XRF and
Adobe Acrobat PDF format.
This device is considered by everyone who needs to have uniform powders
under 1 micron in size as the most important piece of sample prep equipment
that they own. There are other devices that will make fine powders, but this
one does it non-percussively and with minimal chance for operator error messing
up the sample. Unfortunatly we don't own one yet, but we want one and this
link is the equivalent of putting a picture of something you want on your
referigerator door. Any lab that wants to do routing quantitiative analyses
wants to spend the approximately $7K that it costs to own one of these. .
Materials Data (MDI) makes the software which we use for collecting and
analyzing our diffractometer data, including Datascan, Jade and Shadow 4.0.
The Datascan and Databox software can be used to directly operate many diffractometers,
which is particularly good for upgrades of older equipment which is not well
supported by the original vendor. In the world of very expensive software,
their costs are very reasonable (but not low by any means). The site contains
very limited information about their products and contact information.
GBC Scientific (of Australia) both automates older diffractometers and manufactures
economical compact desk-top new instruments. Old systems (including very old
Philips goniometers) can be made to produce new data for a fraction of the
price of a new instrument. The software used with upgrades includes "Visual
XRD" system control, and "Traces" for analysis of data. Both
are 32-bit programs and access standard databases (including the PDF-4). GBC,
who also manufactures other types of analytical equipment, acquired "Diffraction
Technology" in 2001, and is continuing the development and marketing
of their products.
ICDD is a non-profit corporation which produces the JCPDS Power Diffraction
File (PDF) which is the standard database for X-ray Powder Diffraction Data
for natural and synthetic materials. The PDF has recently been greatly expanded
and upgraded to a fully relational database format making it possible to include
a wealth of information not available in the older flat-file version of the
database. Their site contains product information, information about training
sessions, and links to information about the annual "Denver X-Ray Conference"
that the ICDD puts on every year in early August. The "Resources"
pages contain some very useful XRD-related links. Their vendor links page
(http://www.icdd.com/products/vendors.htm)
is a very comprehensive worldwide source list for X-ray Diffraction hardware,
software and accessories.
Updated September 7, 2007. Please send comment about (and suggested additions
to) this page to connolly@unm.edu.
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section), Crystallography and X-Ray Diffraction Tutorials, Radiation Safety
Information and Tutorials, Crystallography and XRD Links, and Links to Vendor
Web Sites. Some documents require the use of Adobe Acrobat Reader which may
be downloaded free from Adobe
Corporation. 
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