Advanced Certificate in Powder Diffraction on the Web Chapter 22 School of Crystallography, Birkbeck College, University of London

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Aims & Objectives

The aim of this release is to provide you with an overall picture of the modern developments with respect to structure determination by powder diffraction (SDPD).

More specific objectives are given below:

• Firstly, you will learn about the basic strategy for structure determination.
• You will then learn about powder pattern decomposition, the essential first step for the majority of structure solution methods.
• You will then be given a brief overview of some of the methods used for structure solution.

After completing this release you should be able to:

• Describe the steps involved in structure determination by powder diffraction (SDPD);
• Describe two different methods as to how intensity data, I(hkl), is routinely extracted from powder diffraction patterns;
• Briefly describe some of the methods by which structures are solved from powder diffraction data.

In this one release, we do not even attempt to be comprehensive, but only intend to give you a flavour of what can be done: this topic alone is the subject of an advanced course in itself. If you wish to take this subject further, then we can recommend the one now available on the Internet (see External Links).

If you have any questions, points requiring clarification or the like, please email your questions to the notice board or contact the course tutors.

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