Crystal-Quasicrystal Transitions

The discovery of five-fold diffraction symmetry by D. Schechtman in 1985 shocked crystallography to its roots. Incommensurable modulation of a crystal changes former identical unit cells into different ones. This radical revolution has given rise to the study of an entirely new class of matter, the quasicrystalline materials. The study of these quasi-periodic crystals brings a unique elucidation ...