Study of annealing effect on crystal and local structures of doped zirconia using multi probe

Ito, Takanori*; Mori, Masashi*; Inukai, Manabu*; Nitani, Hiroaki*; Yamamoto, Takashi*; Miyanaga, Takashi*; Igawa, Naoki   ; Kitamura, Naoto*; Ishida, Naoya*; Idemoto, Yasushi*

The effect of the annealing on the crystal and local structures of doped zirconia was investigated by multi-probe technique using synchrotron X-ray and neutron diffraction, and first principles calculation. It was revealed that the annealing process enhances the periodic distortion of some zirconia compounds by Rietveld/ maximum entropy methods applied to the SR-X-ray and neutron diffractions. In addition, the combined X-ray absorption spectroscopy and first-principles calculations results showed the ZrO polyhedra in zirconia were distorted by the annealing. Those results indicate that the degradation of oxide ionic conductivity by the annealing was related to the periodic distortion in zirconia.