Diffraction by

crystal lattice
 Content
• What is Crystal Lattice ?
• Diffraction
• Optical Interference
• Bragg’s Law of Diffraction
• The principle of Bragg’s Law
• Diffraction Orders
• X-Ray Diffraction
• d-Spacing Formulas
• X-Ray Diffraction Techniques and Applications
What is Crystal Lattice ?

• Crystals are composed of three-

dimensional patterns. These
patterns consist of atoms or groups
of atoms in ordered and
symmetrical arrangements which
are repeated at regular intervals
keeping the same orientation to one
another. By replacing each group of
atoms by a representative point a
crystal lattice is obtained.
 Diffraction
• Diffraction is the spreading out of waves as
they pass through an aperture or around
objects. It occurs when the size of the
aperture or obstacle is of the same order of
magnitude as the wavelength of the
incident wave. For very small aperture sizes,
the vast majority of the wave is blocked. For
large apertures the wave passes by or
through the obstacle without any significant
Diffraction of *plane waves
diffraction.
*Plane wave
• A wave whose surfaces of constant phase are infinite parallel planes
of equal spacing normal to the direction of propagation.

Amplitude is constant in any plane normal to k because

k*r is a constant for such planes
Diffraction (cont)

In an aperture with width

smaller than the
wavelength, the wave
transmitted through the
aperture spreads all the
way round and behaves
like a point source of
waves
Optical Interference

The location of the bright and dark fringes

in Young’s two-slit interference
arrangement: The following equations
allow you to calculate the location of
the bright fringes (where constructive
interference occurs) and dark
fringes (where destructive interference
occurs)
 Bragg’s Law of Diffraction
• When a crystal is bombarded with X-rays of a fixed
wavelength (similar to spacing of the atomic-scale
crystal lattice planes) and at certain incident angles,
intense reflected X-rays are produced when the
wavelengths of the scattered X-rays interfere
constructively. In order for the waves to interfere
constructively, the differences in the travel path
must be equal to integer multiples of the
wavelength. When this constructive interference
occurs, a diffracted beam of X-rays will leave the
crystal at an angle equal to that of the incident
beam.
• Bragg provided a simple, intuitive
approach to diffraction: Regard
crystal as parallel planes of atoms
separated by distance d
Assume specular reflection of X-rays
from any given plane
→ Peaks in the intensity of scattered
radiation will occur when rays from
In 1915, William Henry Bragg and
successive planes interfere William Lawrence Bragg were awarded
constructively the Nobel Prize for their contributions
to crystal structure analysis. They were
the first and (so far) the only father-son
team to have jointly won the prize.
The principle of Bragg’s Law and X-ray diffraction
Bragg diffraction occurs
when electromagnetic
radiation or subatomic
particle waves with
wavelength comparable to
atomic spacings, are incident
upon a crystalline sample,
scattered by the atoms in the
system and undergo
constructive interference in
accordance to Bragg's law.
• Consider conditions necessary to make
the phases of the beams coincide when
the incident angle equals and reflecting
angle. The rays of the incident beam are
always in phase and parallel up to the
point at which the top beam strikes the
top layer at atom z. The second beam
continues to the next layer where it is
scattered by atom B. The second beam
must travel the extra distance AB + BC if
the two beams are to continue traveling
adjacent and parallel. This extra
distance must be an integral ( n )
multiple of the wavelength for the
phases of the two beams to be the
same.
Diffraction Orders

By convention, we set the diffraction

order = 1 for XRD.
For instance, when n=2 , we just
halve the d-spacing to make n=1.
X-Ray Diffraction
A diffraction pattern is obtained by
measuring the intensity of scattered waves
as a function of scattering angle. Very
strong intensities known as Bragg peaks
are obtained in the diffraction pattern
when scattered waves satisfy the Bragg's
Law. Following Bragg's law, each dot (or
reflection) in the diffraction pattern above
forms from the constructive interference
of X-rays passing through a crystal. The
data can be used to determine the crystal's
atomic structure.
n=1, you are looking 111
d-Spacing Formulas

Lattice Types
 X-Ray Diffraction Techniques and Applications

• powder diffraction
• single-crystal diffraction
• thin film techniques
• small-angle diffraction
References
• Drude Theory of Metals (uci.edu)
• 10.6 Lattice Structures in Crystalline Solids - Chemistry 2e | OpenStax
• X-ray diffraction, Bragg's law and Laue equation - Engineering
LibreTexts
• BraggsLaw (carleton.edu)
• 2 Lattice Types (bris.ac.uk)
• Optical Interference Equations (dummies.com)