The majority of nosocomial surgical wound infections develop after the patients' discharge from hospital. A post-discharge surveillance programme including self-reporting of infections by patients and return of questionnaires by patients and surgeons is feasible in an Australian hospital setting. However, such a programme is labour and resource intensive and strategies to increase return of questionnaires are required.

Ferroelectric materials, such as BaTiO(3), have piezoelectric properties that make them attractive for microelectronic and sensing applications. It is well known that the application of mechanical stress or electric field can alter the domain structure in ferroelectrics. Indeed, the constitutive behaviour of a ferroelectric is largely governed by the formation, movement and interaction of its domains. Therefore, it is crucial that the micromechanics of domains and their effect on internal stresses in ferroelectrics be understood. Here we show that the emerging technique of scanning X-ray microdiffraction can be used to measure directly, for the first time, the local triaxial strain fields around 90 degrees domains in single-crystal BaTiO(3). Specifically, residual strain maps in a region surrounding an isolated, approximately 40 microm wide, 90 degrees domain were obtained with 3 microm resolution, revealing significant residual strains. This information is critical for accurate micromechanical modelling of domain behaviour in ferroelectrics.

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