New capabilities for the analysis of nanocrystalline powders using the WPPM approach

The Whole Powder Pattern Modeling (WPPM) is the most complete state-of-the-art method for the analysis of materials microstructure from diffraction data. In WPPM, the entire diffraction pattern is described in terms of physical microstructure models: most of those models have now been extended from the cubic to the general case. A review of the WPPM method and the power of the PM2K software implementing it are here shown: data from multiple phases, multiple patterns and from combined experiments (e.g. diffraction + NMR + TEM + elemental composition + …) can be simultaneously processed within a common frame, to give a fully consistent picture of structure and microstructure of a nanostructured material. Examples of application on real and simulated (atomistic) data will be illustrated, to highlight the potential and the limits of modern line profile analysis techniques.