X-ray fluorescence determination of Ni, Ti and Nb in memory alloys using solution and thin film samples with an internal standard

Abstract

NiTiNb memory alloys are important functional materials in industrial applications. The content of Ni, Ti and Nb must be accurately known in order to control its quality. However, at present, there is not a fast and accurate method that can be used for the accurate analysis of the high content of Ni, Ti and Nb. To solve this problem, an X-ray fluorescence (XRF) method is proposed for determining the amounts of Ni, Ti and Nb in these ternary alloys. The alloy sample was dissolved in a mixture of nitric acid and hydrofluoric acid, and Co was added as an internal standard to improve precision. A portion of solution was transferred into a liquid cell for XRF analysis, and another portion was loaded and dried in a filter paper disk as a thin film specimen for XRF analysis. The features of the two specimen preparation methods were compared and it was found that the solution method was more suitable for the XRF analysis of Ni, Ti and Nb. The proposed XRF method is fast and accurate, and can determine Ni, Ti and Nb simultaneously. The results are in excellent agreement with those given by wet chemical analysis methods and inductively coupled plasma-optical emission spectrometry (ICP-OES).