X-ray diffraction method for the analysis of amorphous and semi-crystalline materials

A computer-implemented method for analyzing X-ray diffraction images of semi-crystalline materials, the method comprising:

• providing a plurality of X-ray diffraction images obtained from a semi-crystalline sample with no external strain applied thereto;
• extracting one or more diffraction patterns from said diffraction images;
• determining a position of one or more intensity peaks in the diffraction patterns;
• comparing said position(s) to similar intensity peaks obtained at a different strain level or obtained in another region of the sample, wherein the difference(s) between the position(s) of the peaks are computed;
• and
• determining a magnitude of an internal strain in at least one region of the sample based on said difference(s) and by correlating the position of one or more intensity peaks in the diffraction patterns with bond lengths in an exposed region of the sample.

A computer-implemented method for analyzing X-ray diffraction images of semi-crystalline materials, the method comprising:

• providing one or more X-ray diffraction images obtained from a semi-crystalline sample;
• extracting one or more azimuthal intensity distributions from said diffraction images;
• determining the position of one or more intensity peaks in the diffraction azimuthal intensity distributions, said position specified by an azimuthal angle;
• and
• determining a magnitude of an internal strain orientations and/or the internal strain levels of at least a region of the sample based on the position of said intensity peak(s), the analysis comprises correlating the position of one or more intensity peaks in said azimuthal intensity distributions with bond lengths in an exposed region of the sample, and
• wherein no external strain or stress is applied to the sample.

An X-ray diffraction method for the analysis of amorphous and/or semi-crystalline materials, the method comprising:

• a) providing a sample, wherein the sample is a semi-crystalline material or an amorphous material, said material comprising at least one amorphous region;
• b) providing a polychromatic X-ray source;
• c) collimating X-rays from the X-ray source into one or more pencil beams;
• d) exposing at least a region of the sample to the one or more pencil beams, whereby the beam(s) are diffracted;
• e) collecting at least some of the diffracted beams in one or more energy dispersive 2D detectors to obtain one or more diffraction images;
• and
• f) analyzing the obtained diffraction image(s) to determine positions of intensity peaks in the diffraction images;
• g) determining a magnitude of an internal strain and/or internal stress by correlating with the positions of intensity peaks in at least the exposed region of the sample,
• wherein said analysis comprises extracting one or more diffraction patterns from the diffraction image(s) and correlating a position of one or more intensity peaks in said diffraction patterns with bond lengths in the exposed region of the sample, wherein said analysis comprises analyzing diffraction signal from the amorphous region of the sample, and
• wherein no external strain or stress is applied to the sample.

An X-ray diffraction method for the analysis of amorphous and/or semi-crystalline materials, the method comprising:

• a) providing a sample, wherein the sample is a semi-crystalline material or an amorphous material, said material comprising at least one amorphous region;
• b) providing a polychromatic X-ray source;
• c) collimating X-rays from the X-ray source into one or more pencil beams;
• d) exposing at least a region of the sample to the one or more pencil beams, whereby the beam(s) are diffracted;
• e) collecting at least some of the diffracted beams in one or more energy-dispersive 2D detectors to obtain one or more diffraction images;
• f) analyzing the obtained diffraction image(s) to deduce depth information of the sample;
• g) determining a magnitude and orientation of an internal strain and/or internal stress by correlating with the depth information in at least the exposed region of the sample, wherein said analysis comprises:
• i. extracting one or more diffraction patterns from the diffraction image(s);
• ii. correlating a position of one or more intensity peaks in said diffraction patterns with bond lengths in the exposed region of the material;
• and
• iii. correlating an azimuthal distribution of the intensity of said one or more peaks with an angular distribution of bonds in the exposed region of the material.