Abstract
With the application of a three-dimensional (3D) characterization technique, serial block-face scanning electron microscopy (SBFSEM), the 3D microstructure of a hydrated cement monomineral, tricalcium silicate (C3S), was measured with nanoscale resolution. The 3D morphologies of anhydrous particles, hydrated products, and capillary pores were visualized. Closed and open pores were discovered inside an anhydrous particle. The size and distribution of both the anhydrous C3S particles and their capillary pores were analyzed quantitatively and the porosity was determined to be 9%. The distribution of pores was found to be in a good agreement with the inner and outer product model of Hu et. al., with an inner shell distance of 860 nm. Considering the spatial resolution of the instrument and the volume of sample measured, most pores in this experiment could be characterized as capillary pores.
Highlights
Tricalcium silicate (C3 S) [1] is the main component in Portland cement, taking up 50–70% of cement mass
Monoclinic C3 S was synthesized by high sintering according to the methods reported by De la Torre et al [45] and ground into powder before hydration
Because of the restriction of sample volume by serial block-face scanning electron microscopy (SBFSEM), the hydration of C3 S was conducted in two steps
Summary
Tricalcium silicate (C3 S) [1] is the main component in Portland cement, taking up 50–70% of cement mass. The hydration reaction occurs between C3 S powder and water to form two products, calcium hydroxide (CH) and calcium silicate hydrate (C–S–H) [2,3]. A variety of techniques have been developed to reveal the influence of material components and microstructure on macro-scale performance and hydration mechanism. Such visualization methods as scanning electron microscopy (SEM) [7,8,9,10,11], transmission electron microscopy (TEM) [12,13,14], atomic force microscopy (AFM) [15,16], and various newly-developed three-dimensional(3D) visualization techniques such as X-ray computed tomography (CT) have played important roles [2,17,18,19,20,21]
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