Abstract
THE attraction which the study of crystals has always exerted, not only upon the scientific worker but also upon a wider circle, is in no danger of abating. The time is perhaps appropriate to discuss a number of developments which have come about during, roughly, the last five years. So far as the crystalline state itself is concerned, the chief change has been one of classification; it is not necessarily the crystal system which determines much of our present-day knowledge, but rather the atomic environment. Thus, in rock salt, each atom (or more strictly, ion) of sodium is surrounded by six ions of chlorine at the corners of an octahedron, and conversely. From the experimental point of view, this advance must be placed to the credit of the X-ray workers; it has only comparatively recently been recognised, however, that upon the structures thus established it was possible to build up a systematic chemistry of the solid state, based upon the conceptions of environment, ionic size, and ionic deformability.
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RAWLINS, F. The New Crystallography. Nature 127, 632–633 (1931). https://doi.org/10.1038/127632a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/127632a0