Thermal study of unaltered and altered dolomitic rock samples from ancient monuments

In this study, the decomposition behaviour of unaltered and altered dolomitic rock samples used in Cultural Heritage buildings was studied by simultaneous TG–DTA experiments at different atmospheres, X-ray diffraction in a high-temperature chamber, and evolved gas analysis. The components of dolomite rock samples and hydrated calcium oxalate formed during the alteration processes of the rocks were characterized, and the decomposition mechanisms of these components were determined. The TG–DTA experiments carried out at CO₂ atmosphere were used to determine the carbonate compounds in the rock samples. The TG–DTA study characterized the presence of organic compounds formed during the biological degradation of the rock samples, possibly responsible of the hydrated calcium oxalate formation.     

Thermal behaviour of ground and unground acid leached vermiculite

Acid leaching of vermiculite is an interesting procedure to prepare high surface area porous silica. Thermal behaviour of unground and ground vermiculite leached with HCl solutions has been studied by TG, DTA, ETA and high temperature XRD. Important differences have been observed in the thermal behaviour of unground and ground vermiculite after the acid treatments. Thus, for the acid-treated unground vermiculite, dehydrated vermiculite, enstatite and cristobalite were formed during the heating, while for the acid-treated ground vermiculite only iron oxides and cristobalite phases were observed. Structural modifications due to acid treatment were responsible for changes in the transport properties determined by ETA for the vermiculite samples.     

A thermal study approach to roman age wall painting mortars

Roman ancient mortars have been widely studied, in connection with both diagnosis and application required for restoring. Thermoanalytical experiments performed on mortars from Pompeii and Herculaneum provided a very good understanding of the technology employed. The mortars from Pompeii were obtained by the proper mixing of lime and marble grains while mortars of Herculaneum by lime and silicates compounds. The position of the endothermic peak of calcite decomposition showed important variations in the different samples studied, which was assigned to the different crystallinity and particle sizes. Experiments under CO₂ flow confirmed the presence of magnesium calcium carbonates.     

Development of master curves for discriminating the mechanism of solid state reactions from experimental data obtained by using the cyclic and controlled rate thermal analysis

The cyclic and Controlled Rate Thermal Analysis method (CRTA) has been used. The two rates automatically selected in the cyclic curve are small enough to allow the two states of the sample to be compared have nearly the same reacted fraction. Thus, the activation energy can be calculated without previous knowledge of the actual reaction mechanism. Provided that the activation energy,E, is known, a procedure has been developed for determining the kinetic law obeyed by the reaction by means of master curves that represent the values of the reacted fraction, α, as a function of?E/R(1/T-1/T _0.5),T _0.5 being the temperature at which α=0.5. This procedure has been tested by studying the thermal decomposition reaction of BaCO₃.     

Study of the thermal decomposition of historical metal threads

A complex of copper perchlorate coordinated with imidazole Cu(C₃N₂H₄)₄(ClO₄)₂ was synthesized and characterized by X-ray single-crystal diffraction. The complex is centrosymmetric in the monoclinic P2(1)/c space group. The low-temperature molar heat capacities and thermodynamic properties of the complex were studied with adiabatic calorimetry (AC). The thermodynamic functions [H _T–H _298.15] and [S _T–S _298.15] were derived in the temperature range from 80 to 370 K with temperature interval of 5 K. Thermal decomposition behavior of the complex in nitrogen atmosphere was studied by thermogravimetric (TG) analysis and differential scanning calorimetry (DSC). The mechanism of the decomposition was deduced to be the breaking up the two Cl–O bonds of the Cl–O–Cu and the Cu–N bonds of the imidazole rings in succession.     

New findings on thermal degradation properties of fluoropolymers

In this paper, the thermal degradation properties of Viton A and Fluorel are investigated by both isoconversional and combined kinetic analysis methods using non-isothermal thermogravimetry technique. It has been found that the heating rate has little affect on the degradation residue of Fluorel and Viton A, where around 1.3% char was formed for Fluorel and 3.5% for Viton A. Different from the literature, the decomposition of Viton A should be considered as an overlapped dehydrofluorination and carbon chain scission process, with activation energy of 214 ± 11 and 268 ± 13 kJ mol^?1, respectively. The effect of dehydrofluorination on degradation of Fluorel is not so significant due to low content of H, and hence, it could be considered as a single-step mechanism with average activation energy of 264 ± 14 kJ mol^?1. The thermal stability of Fluorel is much better than that of Viton A, and the predicted half-life is around 218 min for Fluorel and 49 min for Viton A at 420 °C, which are consistent with experimental values. If using a single-step model as in the literature for Viton A, its half-life at 420 °C would be underestimated for >20%.     

Kinetic Analysis of Solid State Reactions by Means of Stepwise Isothermal Analysis (SIA) and Constant Rate Thermal Analysis (CRTA) A comparative study

The results obtained in this work point out that both SIA and CRTA traces, simulated assuming the same values of the reaction rate, are identical provided that either 'n order’ or diffusion controlled kinetics are concerned. The α-T CRTA plots of solid state reactions fitting an Avrami-Erofeev kinetic model show that the temperature decreases with increasing α until reaching a minimum at a value of the reacted fraction α = αmin characteristic of the Avrami-Erofeev exponent. The shapes of the corresponding SIA diagrams are quite different and a very long isothermal step is obtained. Moreover, the reaction rate is not maintained constant during the isothermal period but it shows a maximum at a value of α depending on the Avrami-Erofeev coefficient. It is important to point out that this αmax value agrees with the corresponding αmin calculated from a CRTA curve by assuming the same Avrami-Erofeev exponent. This revised version was published online in July 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

Effect of Na+ and NH 4 + Cations on Microstructure Changes of Natural Vermiculite During Heat Treatment

Emanation thermal analysis (ETA), DTA, SEM, and XRD were applied for the characterization of the effect of Na⁺ and NH ₄ ⁺ ions used for saturation of natural Mg-vermiculite on the microstructure during heating. The microstructure changes were characterized by ETA under in situ conditions of samples heating in air in the temperature range 20–1300°C. It was found that Na⁺ and NH ₄ ⁺ ions have a significant effect on the microstructure changes during heat treatment of the natural Mg-vermiculite sample saturated with these ions. For Mg-vermiculite and Na⁺ saturated vermiculite thet emperatures of the onset of the collapse of interlaminar space were determined by ETA. Differences in thermal stability of the microstructure of dehydrated vermiculite samples were observed by ETA: the microstructure of dehydrated Mg-vermiculite, and Na-vermiculite was found stable until 650 and 350°C, respectively. For dehydrated NH₄-vermiculite the annealing of the microstructure started at 730°C. The onset temperatures of the formation of new crystalline phases were indicated by ETA as the increase of the radon release rate. The onset temperatures of the ordering of the vermiculite structure or sintering under presence of the glassy stage (for Na-vermiculite), respectively, were determined from the decrease of the radon release rate. The ETA results were confirmed by DTA, XRD and SEM.This revised version was published online in November 2005 with corrections to the Cover Date.