The employment of clay minerals in the transport of water, nutrients, and contaminants depends on a few factors, including permeability, hydration behavior, ion-exchange efficiency, and more. With the application of external stress, it is still difficult to understand how clay particles swell and collapse, how water is retained, how hydration heterogeneities are formed within crystallites, and how interlamellar space is organized. The present work studied the link between geochemical, thermal, kinetic constraints (established at the laboratory scale), and intrinsic clay features by exchanging Na-rich montmorillonite (SWy2) with Ni²⁺, Mg²⁺, or Zn²⁺ cations. By comparing the experimental 00l reflections with the calculated reflections obtained from the structural models, quantitative X-ray diffraction (XRD) analysis has enabled the building of a theoretical profile describing the layer stacking mode (LSM) and allowed the description of interlayer space (IS) configuration along the c* axis. Regardless of the type of the exchangeable cations (EC), XRD modeling revealed that all samples exhibited interstratified hydration behavior within the crystallite size, which probably indicates partial or incomplete saturation of the IS. This theoretical result was defined by the appearance of two hydration states (1W and 2W), which were unrelated to the strain strength creating a higher degree of structural heterogeneity. Using the theoretical decomposition of the observed XRD patterns, the identification of all distinct layer populations and their stacking mode was achieved. The segregated LSM are, therefore, obviously superior as a function of stress strength.

粘土矿物在水、养分和污染物运输中的应用取决于几个因素，包括渗透性、水合行为、离子交换效率等。在施加外部应力的情况下，仍然很难理解粘土颗粒如何膨胀和塌陷、如何保留水分、如何在微晶内形成水合异质性以及如何组织层间空间。^{目前的工作通过将富钠蒙脱石 (SWy2) 与 Ni 2+}、 Mg ²⁺或 Zn ²⁺阳离子交换，研究了地球化学、热、动力学约束（在实验室规模建立）和固有粘土特征之间的联系。通过将实验 00 l反射与从结构模型获得的计算反射进行比较，定量 X 射线衍射 (XRD) 分析能够建立描述层堆叠模式 (LSM) 的理论轮廓，并允许描述层间空间 ( IS) 沿c * 轴的构型。无论可交换阳离子 (EC) 的类型如何，XRD 模型显示所有样品均在微晶尺寸内表现出层间水合行为，这可能表明 IS 部分或不完全饱和。这一理论结果是由两种水合状态（1W 和 2W）的出现定义的，这与产生更高程度的结构异质性的应变强度无关。利用观察到的 XRD 图案的理论分解，实现了所有不同层群及其堆叠模式的识别。因此，分离的 LSM 在应力强度方面具有明显的优越性。