Emeritus Professor Mike Glazer

Abstract:

Prof. Dame Kathleen Lonsdale was one of the two first female Fellows of the Royal Society, having originally been a student of that great British scientist and Nobel Laureate William Henry Bragg. She came to fame initially for her solution of the crystal structure of hexamethyl benzene, thus demonstrating that the benzene ring was flat, of considerable importance to organic chemistry, where it had been proposed before but without proof. This was at a time when the solution of crystal structures was in its infancy, and in its day this work was considered a triumph. As a rare example then of a female physicist, Lonsdale became interested in various aspects of the diffraction of X-rays, and in particular published an important paper on a form of diffraction in which a strongly divergent source was used rather than the usual highly collimated beam. The photographs thus obtained showed a series of arcs and circles, whose positions were so sensitive that they could be used to determine the quality of crystals such as diamond, and even to calculate their lattice dimensions, and hence carbon-carbon bond lengths, to hitherto extraordinary precision. Lonsdale also became known not just as a scientist but as a peace activist and an active member of the Society of Friends. This commentary was written to celebrate the 350th anniversary of the journal Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society.

Abstract:

A single crystal of lead-zirconate-titanate, composition Pb(Zr0.80Ti0.20)O3, was studied by polarized-Raman scattering as a function of temperature. Raman spectra reveal that the local structure deviates from the average structure in both ferroelectric and paraelectric phases. We show that the crystal possesses several, inequivalent complex domain boundaries which show no sign of instability even 200 K above the ferroelectric-to-paraelectric phase transition temperature TC. Two types of boundaries are addressed. The first boundary was formed between ferroelectric domains below TC. This boundary remained stable up to the highest measurement temperatures, and stabilized the domains so that they had the same orientation after repeated heating and cooling cycles. These domains transformed normally to the cubic paraelectric phase. Another type of boundary was formed at 673 K and exhibited no signs of instability up to 923 K. The boundary formation was reversible: it formed and vanished between 573 and 673 K during heating and cooling, respectively. A model in which the crystal is divided into thin slices with different Zr/Ti ratios is proposed. The physical mechanism behind the thermal-stress-induced structural changes is related to the different thermal expansion of the slices, which forces the domain to grow similarly after each heating and cooling cycle. The results are interesting for non-volatile memory development, as it implies that the original ferroelectric state can be restored after the material has been transformed to the paraelectric phase. It also suggests that a low-symmetry structure, stable up to high temperatures, can be prepared through controlled deposition of layers with desired compositions.

Abstract:

The aim of this report is to describe the Seitz notation for symmetry operations adopted by the Commission on Crystallographic Nomenclature as the standard convention for Seitz symbolism of the International Union of Crystallography. The established notation follows the existing crystallographic conventions in the descriptions of symmetry operations.