Mineralogical quantitative phase analysis using the rietveld method. Applications to problems of interest for ceramic industry

The application of the Rietveld method represents the definitive technique for mineralogical quantitative phase analysis of a wide range of materials from powder diffraction data. The Rietveld method allows high accurate quantitative phase analyses to be performed from samples that cannot be analysed by other experimental techniques. The determination of clay and amorphous phases is of great interest for the ceramic industry, covering all the possible materials involved in the ceramic production cycle, from raw materials to ceramic glasses, from pigments to porcelainized grès. We report here examples of quantitative phase analyses of raw materials and ceramic products accomplished at the Dipartimento di Scienze della Terra of the Università di Modena e Reggio Emilia, as results of collaboration projects with ceramic industries and in the context of scientific research projects.