Abstract
Most ceramics are crystalline. The exception is glass, which we usually discuss separately. Not only do the properties of ceramic crystals depend on how the atoms or ions are arranged, but the type and nature of defects also depend on crystal structure. You probably first encountered crystallography when discussing metals. Sixty-five (almost 90%) of the metallic elements are either cubic or hexagonal. In ceramics, many of the most important materials are neither cubic nor hexagonal, so we need to be more familiar with the rest of the subject. It is recommended that you memorize the main structures described in Chapters 6 and 7. In this chapter we provide the means to make this study more systematic.
To understand why ceramics have particular structures and why certain defects form in these structures, it is really important to understand Pauling’s rules. These rules require you to visualize a tetrahedron and an octahedron and to see how they fit together. To understand properties such as piezoelectricity or the mechanisms of phase transformations, you must be able to visualize the crystal structure of the material. This is particularly important when we want to predict the properties of single crystals. We summarize the features of crystallography that we use throughout the text and give references to more specialized resources for rigorous proof of theorems and more detailed discussion.
An important point to keep in mind is that the term “ceramic” generally refers to materials that have been processed in the laboratory or the factory plant but that often do exist in nature. Sometimes the natural minerals are rare such as moissanite, which is now being manufactured as a gemstone. There are far more materials and structures in nature than are used in technology. Understanding the basic principles and knowing where to learn more about minerals may help you find the next monazite or at least to know why it might be useful. A great source for further reading lies in the mineralogical literature.
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General References
A great source for further reading lies in the mineralogical literature. The books by Putnis (1992), Deer, Howie, and Zussman (1992), etc. provide great insight, as does the literature from solid-state chemistry such as the books of Wells (1970), Hyde and Anderson (1989), etc. These references are given in Chapters 6 and 7.
Barrett, C.S. and Massalski, T.B. (1980) Structure of Metals, 3rd edition, Pergamon, New York. Together with Pearson (below) gives more on the Strukturbericht notation.
Buerger, M. (1978) Elementary Crystallography, The MIT Press, Cambridge, MA. One of the best introductions to the subject. At the level of this text.
Burdett, J.K. (1995) Chemical Bonding in Solids, Oxford University Press, Oxford. Crystal modeling on a Macintosh or using Windows XP is easy using CrystalMaker. http://www.crystalmaker.co.uk.
Gale, J.D. (1996) Empirical potential derivation for ionic materials, Phil. Mag. B, 73, 3.
Giacovazzo, C. et al. Fundamentals of Crystallography, 2nd edition, IUCr/Oxford University Press, Oxford. Comprehensive.
International Tables for Crystallography, Vol. A, 5th edition (2002), edited by T. Hahn, D. Reidel, Boston.
Molecular Simulations Inc. (MSI) produces Cerius™. The corresponding structure modeling package is CASTEP. http://www.msi.com/materials/cerius2/castep.html#info.
Nyberg, M., Nygren, M.A., Pettersson, L.G.M., Gay, D.H., and Rohl, A.L. (1996) “Hydrogen dissociation on reconstructed ZnO surfaces,” J. Phys. Chem. 100, 9054.
Phillips, F.C. (1972) An Introduction to Crystallography, 4th edition, Wiley, New York. Includes a clear description of the Herman-Mauguin notation and the 32 classes of crystal symmetry. First published in 1946.
Specific References
Gale, J.D. (1997) “GULP—a computer program for the symmetry adapted simulation of solids,” JCS Faraday Trans. 93, 629.
Hales, T.C. (2005) “A proof of the Kepler conjecture,” Ann. Math. 162, 1065. The paper is 121 pages long! Twelve reviewers spent more than 4 years reviewing it.
Nye, J.F. (1985) Physical Properties of Crystals, Clarendon Press, Oxford.
Pearson, W.B. (1972) The Crystal Chemistry and Physics of Metals and Alloys, Wiley, New York. Gives many more details on crystal notation (see also Villars and Calvert below).
Singh, S. (1997) Fermat’s Last Theorem, Fourth Estate, London.
Villars, P. and Calvert, L.D. (1985) Pearson’s Handbook of Crystallographic Data for Intermetallic Phases, Vols. 1, 2, 3, ASM International, Metals Park, OH.
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(2007). Models, Crystals, and Chemistry. In: Ceramic Materials. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-387-46271-4_5
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-387-46271-4_5
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