Читать книгу Solid State Chemistry and its Applications - Anthony R. West - Страница 16

Solid state chemistry is concerned mainly with crystalline inorganic materials, their synthesis, structures, properties and applications. A good place to begin is with crystal structures and crystal chemistry. All necessary crystal structure information is contained in data on unit cells, their dimensions and the positions or atomic coordinates of atoms inside the unit cell. Crystal chemistry combines this basic structural information with information about the elements, their principal oxidation states, ionic radii, coordination requirements and preferences for ionic/covalent/metallic bonding. A working knowledge of the Periodic Table and the properties of elements is, of course, invaluable to be able appreciate crystal chemistry, but conversely, knowledge of crystal structures and especially crystal chemistry provides a very useful way to gain increased understanding of the elements and their compounds.

Many of the properties and applications of crystalline inorganic materials revolve around a surprisingly small number of structure types. In this chapter, the main families of inorganic structures are reviewed, especially those which have interesting properties; more details of the vast array of structures may be found in the encyclopaedic text by Wells and also in the Wyckoff Crystal Structures book series. First, however, we must consider some basic concepts of crystallography.