ISIS Neutron and Muon Source Data Journal

Hydrogen quantitation and dynamics during the degradation of boric acid

Abstract: Boric acid, B(OH)3, undergoes a series of chemical degradation reactions above room temperature, interpreted as loss of water molecules till the final result of boron oxide (B2O3). Previous investigations suggest two- or three-step reactions, involving metaboric and tetraboric acid, although the interpretation of results from differential scanning calorimetry and thermal gravimetric analysis is often complicated by broad transition temperatures and dependence upon the sample mass. We propose a neutron experiment exploiting the capabilities of Deep Inelastic Neutron Scattering (DINS). In particular, we propose to measure the intensity of the hydrogen neutron Compton profile along a temperature scan between room temperature and the temperature where only boron oxide will be present in the system, thus providing a direct measurement of the stoichiometry of the system. As degradation reaction are accompanied by release of water in the gas phase, water removal from the sample volume will be assured by flow of inert gas in the container. Following the temperature scan, having found suitable temperatures where the intermediate phases will be stable, standard DINS measurements will be performed on the B-OH hydrogen, to unveil the effect of intermolecular interactions on the isotropy of the nuclear momentum distribution, providing information on the local potential. If successful, this investigation will represent a case study to monitor similar temperature-induced reaction processes.

Principal Investigator: Professor Giovanni Romanelli
Experimenter: Professor Felix Fernandez-Alonso
Experimenter: Ms Margherita Simoni
Experimenter: Professor Roberto Senesi
Experimenter: Professor Alessio Bocedi
Experimenter: Dr Mattia Gaboardi
Experimenter: Dr Daniela Cazzato
Local Contact: Dr Matthew Krzystyniak

DOI: 10.5286/ISIS.E.RB2610227

ISIS Experiment Number: RB2610227

Publisher: STFC ISIS Neutron and Muon Source

Data format: RAW/Nexus
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Data Citation

The recommended format for citing this dataset in a research publication is as:
[author], [date], [title], [publisher], [doi]

For Example:
Professor Giovanni Romanelli et al; (2026): Hydrogen quantitation and dynamics during the degradation of boric acid, STFC ISIS Neutron and Muon Source, https://doi.org/10.5286/ISIS.E.RB2610227

Data is released under the CC-BY-4.0 license.