ABSTRACT
When the American Ceramic Society celebrated its own centennial review in 1998, the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST)/American Ceramic Society (ACerS) publication of phase diagrams was cited as one of the two most important accomplishments of the Society affecting the worldwide development and application of ceramics. Working together, NIST and ACerS have published more than 20 000 phase diagrams. Phase diagrams are graphical representations of the regions of distinct chemical and structural behavior of materials in thermodynamic equilibrium. The regions are defined by the composition of the material and by the measurement conditions. In the process of this expansion, the series acquired a much broader scope than was originally anticipated. To reflect that broader scope more accurately, the name of the series was changed to Phase Equilibria Diagrams. The phase diagrams published by the NIST/ACerS program are proving to be vital to the development of emerging technologies.
