Quantitative Characterization of Precipitate Microstructures in Metallic Alloys Using Small-Angle Scattering

Quantitatively characterizing precipitate microstructures in metals by small-angle scattering poses specific challenges as compared to other areas of application of this technique. In terms of size and morphology evaluation, these include the presence of a significant size distribution, non-isotropic shapes, and interpretation complicated by a partial averaging due to a non-random texture. In terms of volume fraction evaluation, these include the imperfect knowledge of the chemical composition of very small objects. This paper, based on a presentation given at the “Neutron and X-Ray Studies of Advanced Materials V: Centennial” symposium of the 2012 TMS conference, reviews the strategies that can be applied in different characteristic cases to obtain a robust quantification of precipitate microstructures.