Syntheses and thermal analyses of curium trichloride

Curium trichloride was synthesized by the solid state reaction of curium nitride with cadmium chloride heated up to 748 K in a dynamic vacuum. The product was hexagonal ²⁴⁴CmCl₃, of which lattice parameters were determined to be a = 0.7385 ± 0.0005 and c = 0.4201 ± 0.0005 nm. The melting temperature of the ²⁴⁴CmCl₃ sample was determined to be 970 ± 3 K by differential thermal analyses using a gold crucible. These values are close to those reported in literature. The results show that mg-scale CmCl₃ samples for thermochemical measurements were prepared from the purified oxide sample without the use of corrosive reagents.