STRUCTURE RELATIONSHIP TO DIELECTRIC, ELASTIC AND CHIRAL PROPERTIES

Crystallography provides a major approach toward reaching an understan ding of the relationship between crystal structure and material physic al properties. The specific relationships of five highly structure dep endent physical properties, namely piezoelectricity, pyroelectricity, ferroelectricity, ferroelasticity and optical activity, to atomic arra ngement are developed in this Lead Article. The major attributes of ea ch property, together with the structural measurements required to est ablish the property-structure relationship, are introduced and illustr ative results for each are given. Predictive criteria that emphasize t he insight leading to new property-structure relationships are present ed as is an expanded experimental access to the crystallographic study of materials.