TY - JOUR T1 - Impact of Chemical Impurities on the Crystalline Cement Clinker Phases Determined by Atomistic Simulations JF - Crystal Growth & Design Y1 - 2011 A1 - Hegoi Manzano A1 - Engin Durgun A1 - Mohammad Javad Abdolhosseini Qomi A1 - Franz-Josef Ulm A1 - Roland Jean-Marc Pellenq A1 - Jeffrey C Grossman AB -
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The presence of chemical substitutions is believed to play a crucial role in the hydration reactions, structure, and elastic properties of cement clinker phases. Hence, substitutions are of great technological interest, as more efficient production of cement clinkers would result in a reduction of CO2 emissions, as well as possible economic benefits. Here we use a combination of classical and quantum mechanical simulation methods to study the detailed physicochemical changes of the clinker phases alite (Ca3SiO5) and belite (Ca2SiO4) when Mg2+, Al3+ and Fe3+ guest ions are incorporated into their structure. Using classical force field methods, we considered random substitutions among possible sites and different compositions in order to identify the preferential substitution sites on the crystalline structures. Then, the resulting structural changes that take place to accommodate the guest ions are investigated and discussed in detail. Using quantum mechanical density functional theory calculations the electronic structure of representative configurations has been computed to determine the potential impact of impurities on the reactivity.

VL - 11 IS - 7 JO - Crystal Growth & Design ER -