WHISKERS OF TIN BY TOPOCHEMICAL REACTION

It has been found that sodium titanate powder can be converted to TiN powder by treatment with gaseous ammonia at 1000-degrees-C. This observation has led to a test of the effect of ammonia on potassium titanate filaments. The result was a product which consisted of TiN filaments with essentially the same morphology as the starting titanate material. Examination of the filamentous material before and after the reaction (which we designated "topochemical") by scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and analytical transmission electron microscopy (TEM) confirmed that even single crystal filaments (whiskers) of K2Ti6O13 were topochemically converted to TiN whiskers.