Abstract
To clarify lattice fluctuations and precursor phenomena accompanied by structural phase transition in stuffed tridymite compounds, changes in diffuse scattering as a function of temperature in Ba0.6Sr0.4Al2O4 have been carefully investigated by powder X-ray diffraction using synchrotron radiation, electron diffraction and transmission electron microscopy (TEM) experiments. In situ electron diffraction experiments revealed that Ba0.6Sr0.4Al2O4 exhibits lattice fluctuation manifested as a unique honeycomb-shaped diffuse scattering in the wide temperature range between 298 and 100 K. Unlike in the case of BaAl2O4, Ba0.6Sr0.4Al2O4 shows no structural phase transition to the ferroelectric structure with the hexagonal P63 space group in the temperature range. In contrast, it is revealed that the electron beam irradiation to the Ba0.6Sr0.4Al2O4 sample inside the transmission electron microscope induced structural change from the hexagonal P6322 structure to the modulated structure with double periodicity in the three equivalent 〈110〉 directions in the low-temperature region. This implies that the total energy difference between these two structures is small. The hexagonal P6322 structure transforms into the modulated one with short correlation length owing to some small external perturbations.
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