Structural Analysis of Hydrolytic Condensed Zirconium Oxide by the Anomalous X-ray Scattering Method

The anomalous X-ray scattering (AXS) technique has been applied to obtain the environmental radial distribution function (RDF) around a zirconium in amorphous ZrO2 prepared by hydrolytic condensation of zirconium alkoxide. The environmental RDF was determined from the intensities measured at the Zr K absorption edge using synchrotron radiation and compared with the ordinary RDF. By combining the environmental and ordinary RDFs of amorphous ZrO2, zirconium is quantitatively confirmed to be surrounded by six oxygens at a distance of 0.214 nm and a considerably distorted ZrO6 octahedron is likely to exist as a fundamental local ordering unit structure. A possible structural model of amorphous ZrO2 in near neighbour region has also been proposed.