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Organic crystals

Packing down

Nature Materials volume 9, pages 7–8 (2010)Cite this article

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Most crystalline materials expand when heated. Now, the packing arrangement of an organic dumbbell-shaped molecule is seen to bring about a large thermal contraction of its crystal lattice.

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Figure 1: Geometric flexibility can translate an expansion in one direction into a perpendicular contraction5.
Figure 2: Schematic of thermal expansion.

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  1. Andrew L. Goodwin is in the Department of Chemistry, Inorganic Chemistry Laboratory, University of Oxford, South Parks Road, Oxford, OX1 3QR, UK. andrew.goodwin@chem.ox.ac.uk,

    Andrew L. Goodwin

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  1. Andrew L. Goodwin
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Goodwin, A. Packing down. Nature Mater 9, 7–8 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1038/nmat2597

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