Abstract
In the work presented here, a synthetic and structural study of K2NiF4-related oxides and oxide fluorides is reported. Several ranges of oxides and oxide fluorides have been synthesised and structurally characterised by Rietveld refinement of X-ray and Neutron diffraction data. Many of these materials are novel, and show some interesting structural, chemical and physical properties. These materials were all prepared via the standard solid state technique. Because most of the oxide fluorides presented here are not stable at high temperatures, their synthesis involved a two stage process; production of an oxide precursor, followed by low temperature fluorination of this precursor. Throughout this study, the polymer-based fluorinating agent, PVDF, was shown to be effective for the production of a number of novel oxide fluorides. In addition, during the course of the work presented here, the new fluorinating agent, (PTFE) was discovered, and also shown to be effective for this purpose.