Phase Equilibria Diagrams Online Search

Welcome to the Phase Equilibria Diagrams Online Search system. Searching available diagrams is all that is open to the public. Please log in to get access to view the repository of diagrams. If you do not have an account you can purchase a subscription to the service at The American Ceramic Society Website

Search by Chemical System

Search components can be entered in any order. Elements can be entered in lieu of the chemical formula for a desired search component, e.g. Al-O for Al2O3, using the appropriate search logic (see below). Rules for chemical system assignment are given on the Help Page - see Chemical System Designation Rules. These determine which search components can be entered (and populate the component drop-down list).

Equals search - most restrictive:

Search results will return only those chemical systems that contain the components as typed.

Example: If you typed in "Si-C", the result set will contain only records where the chemical system is exactly C-Si.

Containing All (and Only) search:

Search results will return all of those records with chemical systems containing all the chemical elements or chemical compounds entered in the text box, but nothing else. This differs from the "Equals" search in that it allows elements entered as search terms to be found in compounds.

Example: If you typed in "Si-C", the result set will include only chemical systems containing SiC and C-Si.

Containing Any (But Nothing Else) search:

Search results will return all records with chemical systems containing any of the elements or compounds entered in the text box, but no other elements or compounds.

Example: If you typed in "Si-C", the result set will only include systems containing C, Si, SiC, or C-Si.

Containing search - the least restrictive:

Search results will return all records with chemical systems containing all elements or compounds typed in the text box. This is the least restrictive search method.

Example: If you typed in "Si-C", the result set will include chemical systems such as the following: C-O-Si, SiC-SiO2, SiC-Si3N4, C-N-Si, C-SiO2-Si3N4, SiC-SiO2-Si3N4, SiC-SiO2-Si3N4, C-SiO2-Si3N4, C-N-O-Si, C-O-Si, B-SiC, Si-SiC-T, C-Ni-S, C-SiC-SiO2-Si3N4, C-O-Si, H2-SiC, C-Nb-Si, Al-Be-C-SiC, C-Cr-Si, and Al-C-N-SiC-Si3N4.

Not Containing (Elements and Compounds):

The user can narrow a search by entering a chemical element (e.g. O) and/or compounds (e.g. Al2O3) in the 'Not Containing' text box.

An example of a combination of excluded components: O-N. This will result in the exclusion of any chemical system with oxygen, an oxide component (Al2O3, SiO2), elemental N, or N-containing (Si3N₄).

Equals

Containing All (and only)

Containing Any (but nothing else)

Containing

Components or Elements

Enter compounds and/or elements separated by spaces or hyphens.

Invalid Component(s)

This shows components that are not valid for searching the database.

Components may be invalid due to misspelling, incorrect delimiters between components, or because you have entered a component which is not included in the list of components that are available in the database.

Component List

Enter the search component manually or by selecting from the Component drop-down list below, using a space or hyphen if entering more than one (in any order). Enter the chemical symbols for elements correctly using appropriate upper- and lower-case letters. The database assumes that all numbers appearing in chemical formulas for compounds are subscripts. For example, to find all systems containing zirconium oxide, enter ZrO2, or Zr-O. To find all systems containing zirconium oxide, yttrium chloride, and sodium sulfate, enter ZrO2-YCl3-Na2SO4.

See the Help Page for Chemical System Designation rules, which determine the list of searchable components.

Chemical system classifications are designed generally to name the simplest possible chemical components and these are not necessarily the end-members of the diagram. Mixed compounds are not used in the assignment of chemical systems (with the exception of oxides of elements that are not solids at ambient temperature (e.g., C, N, S, CI), see the Help Page for Chemical System Designation rules). For example, BaTiO3, Mg2SiO4, KAlCl4, etc., do not appear in the chemical systems index and are not searchable components. The diagram MgSiO3-CaSiO3 will be classified by the simplest component oxides CaO-MgO-SiO2. The binary system NaAlCl4-KAlCl4 will be classified by the simplest component compounds NaCl-KCl-AlCl3. The simplest components are frequently those compounds that would be used in the laboratory to synthesize the more complex compound.

Not Containing

The user can narrow a search by entering a chemical element (e.g. O) and/or compounds (e.g. Al2O3) in the 'Not Containing' text box.

For example, entering Si-C and Containing, the least restrictive search logic, returns chemical systems such as C-O-Si, SiC-SiO2, SiC-Si3N4, C-N-Si, C-SiO2-Si3N4, SiC-SiO2-Si3N4, SiC-SiO2-Si3N4, C-SiO2-Si3N4, C-N-O-Si, C-O-Si, B-SiC, Si-SiC-T, C-Ni-S, C-SiC-SiO2-Si3N4, C-O-Si, H2-SiC, C-Nb-Si, Al-Be-C-SiC, C-Cr-Si, and Al-C-N-SiC-Si3N4.

An example of a combination of Not Containing components is O-N. This will result in the exclusion of any chemical system with oxygen, an oxide component (Al2O3, SiO2), elemental N, or an N-containing component (Si3N4).

Clicking this button will toggle the visibility of the information icons.

Clicking on an information icon will launch a dialog that will provide you with information about the feature found next to the icon.

This function will return a list of all published figures in the database. The list can be sorted by clicking the title bar for any of the columns (PED Figure No., PED Volume, Chemical System(s), Authors, or Publication Year). When sorted by Chemical System, the user obtains the electronic equivalent of the hard-copy Cumulative Indices that were previously published after each book was released. This new feature provides a shortcut - the user can display the same list by leaving the search "Components or Elements" field blank, choosing All from the PED Volume drop-down list, and clicking Search.

Search by Publication Characteristics

PED Figure Number

Enter the exact PED Figure number if it is known.

Figure numbers for diagrams in special publications must be entered with the appropriate letter and dash; e.g., 92-168 for figure number 168 in Annual '92.

      S = High-Temperature Superconductor I

      SII = High-Temperature Superconductor II

      Zr = Zirconium + Zirconia Systems

      EC = Electronic Ceramics

Publication Year

A search can be narrowed by entering the publication year. To enter a range, separate the beginning and ending years with a hyphen.

PED Volume

This drop-down list contains all published volumes. Note that publication of hard-copy books was discontinued after Vol. 14, therefore PED Figures starting with Vol. 15 (Figure 11638 and up) are only available electronically. However, the user may obtain the book-equivalent of the complete PED Figure (commentary and all diagrams) by printing out the .pdf file downloaded by clicking the PED Figure No. in the search return list (or by clicking View Figure after selecting the desired Figure Number) - see the Help icon for View Figure.

Language

This list box contains all languages used in the original literature from which the data were obtained. The user can narrow a search by choosing the language of the original literature source.

Authors

Enter the last name(s) of any of the authors of target publications. If two names are entered, only publications containing both names will be returned.

Searches are case-insensitive. Every non-space string of letters is both preceded by and followed by an implicit wildcard. If the search explicitly matches an author's name, it will only return figures that include that author. If the search does not explicitly match an author's name, it will return any figures whose authors include the entered string.

It is advisable to enter only the last names of authors. Author names may appear differently in different publications and, in general, the database contains the name as given in the cited reference. There are some exceptions with regard to the names of authors from Asian countries and names which have been transliterated from other languages into the English alphabet. Data Center staff have attempted to determine proper spellings and order of names in general use. There are, however, differences in spellings and name order depending on the policies of various publications in different countries. Authors may, therefore, appear under more than one name or more than one spelling and the user is urged to vary the name if a first search does not return appropriate results.

Commentary Text

Enter one or more keywords to search for PED Figures that contain these words in their commentary text.

Searches are case-insensitive. Every non-space string of letters is both preceded by and followed by an implicit wildcard. An asterisk (*) may be inserted anywhere and will be interpreted as a wildcard. For example, searching for ethyl will return figures containing the words that themselves contain ethyl (e.g. methyl, ethylene, etc.). Searching for "gr*y" would return figures that include the words gray, grey, and hungry.

Note: This application attempts to match the text entered in this field to the text of published commentaries. Note that this is a "best effort" search. Results may not perfectly match expectations. This is due to the nature in which the commentary content is stored by the application.

Include INFO Listings

Checking this box will include entries in the INFO file in all search results. The INFO file contains approximately 3,000 entries of literature references that contain phase equilibrium information but, in general, no diagram (or a diagram that does not obey the phase rule). These papers have been retrieved from the archival literature during our systematic searches for new content for the database. Some papers may have data from which a diagram may be plotted, while in others only the results of a study, usually thermodynamic, are discussed. The list is by no means exhaustive because collecting and identifying references without diagrams was not systematic until the mid-1980's. Regardless, it was deemed useful to provide this information. Users should be aware that this file has not been checked in detail for accuracy by the data center staff. INFO entries, can be sorted and searched by Chemical System(s), Authors Last Name, and Publication Year. The default option is to exclude the INFO file.

The thumbnail diagram window shows a preview of the first diagram given in the PED figure selected in the main search results window on the left side of the interface. For figures with more than one diagram, the preview will display the diagram selected in the Diagram search results window located under the preview.

The preview diagram does not have labels, and is useful to display the type of diagram in the figure. For example, the chemical system designation for a figure with the binary diagram MgSiO3-CaSiO3 is CaO-MgO-SiO2, which would appear in the search return list. The preview diagram would indicate to the user that the diagram is for a binary, not a ternary system.

Please Login to View the PED Diagram

Selecting 'View Diagram' after selecting a diagram number in this search return list will launch the diagram interactively with the PED Viewer. All diagrams in the database can now be saved and printed as high quality .pdf, .jpg, or .png files using the Viewer option. Consult the Help file on the Viewer screen for instructions on each of the menu items along the top of the screen.

The PED Editor, completed in 2012, is part of new custom software now used by the Data Center to digitize all diagrams for this database. The PED Editor is downloadable for free, see https://www.nist.gov/srd/nist-standard-reference-database-31 and https://pages.nist.gov/PEDEditor/