Following shape and structure evolution of carbonaceous aggregates obtained in high pressure/high temperature environment

The aim of the present paper is to present an identification procedure to infer and monitor vs. time the structural properties of combustion generated agglomerates composed of Rayleigh spherical subunits. As reported elsewhere (di Stasio et al., 1996) the dissymmetry ratios, i.e., ratios of light intensities scattered at two different angles, are powerful tools of investigation, standing their low (within 4%) sensitivity to refractive index variations. These latter are expected to occur during agglomeration phase and are responsible of high uncertainties in the reduction of scattering/extinction data. We demonstrate that it is possible to retrieve the dominant aggregation morphology and aggregate main parameters, like spherule size, mean number of spherules per aggregate and average refractive index.