Short-time X-ray diffraction for the investigation of chemical reactions and phase transitions

The usual powder diffraction technique needs about one hour for the registration of a pattern with either a Guinier camera or a powder diffractometer. This is a long time compared to the time of most chemical reactions and phase transitions. Quite recently the recording time has been reduced by using position-sensitive detectors and rotating-anode X-ray sources, but the registration time is still about one minute. With a Guinier diffractometer in front of a synchrotron-radiation source a time resolution of 300 μs can be achieved.