Incommensurate Crystallography

For many years it was believed that translational symmetry would be the fundamental property of crystal structures of natural and synthetic compounds. It is now recognised that many compounds crystallise without translational symmetry of their atomic structures. "Incommensurate Crystallography" gives a comprehensive account of the superspace theory for the description of crystal structures and symmetries of these incommensurately modulated crystals and incommensurate composite crystals. It thus provides the necessary background for quantitative analysis of incommensurate crystals by methods in Solid State Chemistry and Solid State Physics. The second half of "Incommensurate Crystallography" is devoted to crystallographic methods of structural analysis of incommensurate compounds. Thorough accounts are given of the diffraction by incommensurate crystals, the choice of parameters in structure refinements, and the use of superspace in analysing crystal structures. The presentation of methods of structure determination includes modern methods like the Maximum Entropy Method and Charge Flipping.

1 - Structure and diffraction of aperiodic crystals
2 - Modulated crystals in superspace
3 - Symmetry of modulated crystals
4 - Incommensurate composite crystals
5 - Superstructures and the commensurate approximation
6 - Quantitative description of the diffraction by aperiodic crystals
7 - Structure refinements
8 - Electron density in superspace
9 - Determination of the superspace group
10 - Methods of structure solution
11 - Systematic crystal chemistry

Professor Sander Van Smaalen, Laboratory of Crystallography, University of Bayreuth, Germany.