Crystallography matters ... more!

This year's exhibition at Carolina Rediviva, Platonic Solids and Quasicrystals, is all about crystallography and shows how this science has been perceived over time. By collaborating with the Museum of Evolution at Uppsala University, we can exhibit books side by side with real crystals, models of crystals and instruments that have been used to measure the angles of these strange formations that seem to have been cut and polished by human hand whereas in fact they have been shaped by uniform atomic structures.

Welcome on a beautiful journey through this collection of historical scientific books and artifacts.

The workshop "Frontiers of Crystallography" was held in Novosibirsk State University, as a satellite event of the 3rd International Conference "Crystallogenesis and Mineralogy" and included comprehensive lectures and tutorials on the following topics:

1. Crystal growth in Nature, laboratory and industry
• Crystals and crystallization (a general introduction)
• Crystal growth of non-linear optical materials
• Crystal growth of synthetic diamonds
• Crystal growth and experimental mineralogy
• Crystal growth of magnetic materials

2. High-pressure diffraction and Raman microscopy in crystal genesis and mineralogy
• Instrumentation for generating HP, HP-HT and HP-LT conditions
• Instrumentation for data collection using in situ X-ray diffraction at high pressures
• Processing of high-pressure diffraction data
• In situ Raman microscopy and spectroscopy at high pressures: experimental techniques, data analysis and applications

3. Frontiers of crystallography: aperiodic, twinned and disordered structures

Read a report (in English) | Read a press release (in Russian) | See the photo gallery

Crystals - known to everybody as gems, snow crystals, or salt grains - are widespread in the nature around us. The investigation of their structure and properties means looking inside the intimate of atom geometries - a look contributing to the scientific development of chemistry, solid state physics, Earth sciences, and even, surprisingly, biology and medicine.

A century has passed since the crystals first revealed their secrets. In the meantime crystallography has become the pillar of the atomic and molecular sciences, showing us the structure of DNA, allowing the comprehension and the development of computer memories, visualizing the formation of proteins within cells, and yielding ever new materials and drugs.

This is why on July 2012, resolution 66/284 of the General Assembly of the United Nations declared 2014 - after 100 years from the awarding of the first Nobel Prize for the discovery of the diffraction of X-rays by crystals - the International Year of Crystallography.

The exhibition organized at the University of Padova wishes to celebrate the theoretical and applied aspects of crystallography on the occasion of the International Year.

See the photos of the exhibition taken during the Opening Ceremony on 5 October 2013

"Les cristallographes en Midi-Pyrénées" participate to the festival La Novela from the 7th to the 12th october 2013 in Toulouse, France (Village du Quai, Allée Jules Guesde). 

The 2013 Annual Meeting of the Crystallographic Society of Japan took place on the Kurokami Campus of Kumamoto University on 12 and 13 October. It was followed by a one-day special event, 'Crystallography Now and in the Beginning', consisting of public guest lectures and training sessions to celebrate the International Year of Crystallography 2014. Around 200 members of the public, mostly high-school students, attended a wide-ranging series of lectures and enjoyed practical sessions with crystals, wooden models, microscopes, and oscilloscope to test quartz piezoelectricity.

Photos of the event 

In conjunction with IYCr2014, the year 2013 is celebrated in Poland as the Year of Jan Czochralski (1885-1953) – crystallographer, chemist, metallurgist, the forefather of the electronic industry, most known for the development of the single-crystal growth method commonly used in the fabrication of silicon wafers.

http://www.nauka.gov.pl/ministry/the-jan-czochralski-year/

“L’ENIGMA ESCHER- PARADOSSI GRAFICI TRA ARTE E GEOMETRIA” is the title of a major retrospective exhibition of the work of Maurits Cornelis Escher, on display in Reggio Emilia until 23 March 2014.

The exhibition presents the work of the Dutch graphic artist from his debut on the scene to his latest years, bringing together 130 works, including lithographs, etchings and drawings, on loan from museums, libraries and national institutes – among which the Galleria d’Arte Moderna of Rome and the Fondazione Wolfsoniana of Genoa – as well as from some important, private collections.

A special section is dedicated to tilings, with a panel illustrating the 17 crystallographic planar groups and some original examples of Escher's plane-filling drawings.

The exhibition will then move to Caraglio (Cuneo, Italy), where it will be on display from 29 March to 29 June.

The exhibition is included in the events for IYCr2014 celebrations in Italy. 

Read the press release mentioning the connection of the exhibition with IYCr2014 (in Italian)

We are pleased to announce the Second All‐Russian Conference to be held in Novosibirsk on 21‐25 October 2013.
Complex diagnostics of functional materials is the basis for the investigation and optimization of their properties. The objectives of the conference is to discuss the current state of the physical and chemical methods of research and their application to a wide range of functional materials: conductors, semiconductors, superconductors, magnetic and optical materials, phosphors, thermochromic materials, catalysts, adsorbents, membranes, polymers. Such materials can be crystalline and/or amorphous composites, thin films, nanostructures, high‐purity substances.
Special attention will be devoted to the chemical and physical methods for studying the composition and structure of nanomaterials. The experience of the previous conference MISSFM‐2009 showed that this is a multidisciplinary area with numerous research groups that specialize in various disciplines. The conference is held on the eve of the International Year of Crystallography (2014) declared by the United Nations, and dedicated to the centenary of the discovery of X‐ray diffraction.
We invite experts in the field of X‐ray diffraction and X‐ray analysis, spectral, magnetic resonance techniques, electron and probe microscopy, methods of chemical analysis and other methods to take part in the conference.

STRUCTURE SOLUTION FROM POWDER AND SINGLE-CRYSTAL DATA

Read a report (in French) | See the photo gallery | Watch the videos of the lectures

Lecture provided by Professor Maria Gdaniec at Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznan, entitled "The Year 2014 as the International Year of Crystallography" 

The First Latin American Crystallography Meeting is being organized as a joint event with the IXth Annual Meeting of the Argentinean Crystallographic Association in Córdoba, Argentina. It will be hosted by the Universidad Nacional de Córdoba - www.unc.edu.ar , coinciding with the celebration of the 400^th anniversary of its foundation in 1613. UNC is the oldest university in Argentina and number 4 among the oldest in Latin America. Its original pavilions and buildings have been declared by UNESCO as World Cultural Heritage of Humanity.

The scientific program will include plenary lectures, oral presentations and poster sessions. Full details and information can be found at the homepage of the event: www.cristalografia2013.com.ar. Satellite meetings include a "Workshop on neutron techniques for the characterization of materials" and a "School on crystal structure analysis and microcrystalline characterization using powder diffraction data".

At the Russian Academy of Sciences, school children continue to discover the wonderful world of science in the framework of the "Academic hour".

On 30 October 2013, Prof Elena Boldyreva gave a lecture on "Crystals - how and why studying them?'. The lecture is particularly relevant, since 2014 has been officially declared by the UN "International Year of Crystallography".

Read a report (in Russian) | Download a press release (from the newsletter of the Siberian branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences; in Russian)