Preface
The material in this book is derived from an intensive course in X-ray
structure analysis organized on behalf of the Chemical Crystallogra-
phy Group of the British Crystallographic Association and held every
two years since 1987. As with a crystal structure derived from X-ray
diffraction data, the course contents have been gradually refined over
the years and they reached a stage in 1999 (the seventh course) where
we considered they could be published, and hence made available to a
far wider audience than can be accommodated on the course itself. The
result was the first edition of this book, published in 2001. The authors
were the principal lecturers on the course in 1999 and they revised
and expanded the material, while converting the lecture notes into a
book format. Because of its origin, the book represented a snapshot of
the intensive course, which has continued to evolve, especially as the
subject of chemical crystallography has undergone significant changes,
mainly due to the widespread availability of area detector technology,
the exponential increase in computing power and improvements in soft-
ware, and greater use of synchrotron radiation and powder diffraction.
Nevertheless, the underlying principles remain valid, and the particular
application of those principles can be adapted to new developments for
some time to come.
By the time of the eleventh course in 2007, its contents and the team
of principal lecturers had changed markedly, and we were asked to con-
sider a second edition of the book reflecting these developments. This
has been encouraged and assisted by the use of a consistent template for
the 2007 course notes, and these have been used as the basis for this new
edition. Nevertheless, any readers who participated in the 2007 course
will detect a number of changes, particularly in the inclusion of some
material not coveredin the lecture notes, some updating, anddifferences
of style made necessary by a non-interactive format.
Since this book, like its first edition, owes its origins to the course, we
acknowledge here our large debt to those who have dedicated much
effort to the organization of the course since its inception; without them
thisbook would never have existed,evenas an idea. The firstfivecourses
were held at the University of Aston, where the local organizers Phil
Lowe and Carl Schwalbe set a gold standard of course administration
and smooth operation, establishing many ofthe enduring characteristics
valued by participants ever since. Following the move to the Univer-
sity of Durham, Vanessa Hoy and then Claire Wilson developed these
firm foundations to even further heights of excellence, presenting a
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