I understand that the peak-width of diffraction data increases with increasing amounts of heterogeneous, localized (AKA "micro-") strain.
So, if you have a single crystal with atomic impurities in it that each create micro-strain in the lattice, you would expect the amount of peak-broadening...
Thanks for the reply.
Why would the number of impurity atoms in a specific area go with ##n^{2/3}##? (and I'm assuming you are using '##n##' to represent atomic concentration?) Is there some sort of geometrical justification for this?
Also, I guess I'd be willing to accept that the ##n^{1/2}##...
When you add impurity atoms to a material, the yield strength often increases by a process known as solid solution hardening. This is because the impurity atoms create a barrier to dislocation motion. The literature describing this phenomenon dates back to the 1960s with some famous papers by...