What are crystals?

A collection of useful sites

• See Beautiful crystals in:
  • the Crystal Apothecary
  • Amethyst Galleries Mineral gallery useful info on minerals and images of crystals for sale
  • the Smithsonian Gem and Mineral Collection USA
• Crystal growing
  • Competitions in the UK
    • News of 1999 National Crystal Growing Competition
    • E region 1998 list of winners
    • Primary School winners in 1997
    • SE winners November 1997
  • Advice for students from the USA
    • crystal growing for school students
    • crystal growing for researchers and graduate students
    • at Stanford University
• cool chocolate, how crystallography helps to give chocolate that 'melt-in-the-mouth sensation
• How crystallography helped to make more comfortable bath salts (coming soon)
• Gems
  • Find out about Gems with links to 'where do gems come from', 'diamonds- origins to cutting'. Sapphire - beauty in gems'.
  • Gem Association of Great Britain
  • In the bag, jewellers resource links to Web reference sites
• Ice crystals beautiful but dangerous
• Cover Story Dec 95 'Crystallography News' - how do molecules use light to help us see? work on this light harvesting protein will help us understand.
• Marvellous minerals
  • The Mineral and Gemstone Kingdom in the USA
  • Annotated links to internet resources, especially for mineralogists, petrologists, crystallographers, geologists. in the Institute of Mineralogy, University of Wuerzburg, Germany
  • Mineralogical crystal structure databases
    • in the UK Mineral Web
    • In the USA American Mineralogist Crystal Structure database lets you search for a mineral by name and find out if it has a known structure. It has links to a section of mineral movies where you can watch mineral structures changing
• what's inside a quartz watch
• uses of liquid crystals range from making flat panels for computer displays to measuring temperature.
• If your question is not answered here, try one of these web anwering sites
  • Science Line is a free public science information service based in the UK. We answer questions on all aspects of science, medicine, technology and engineering. Phone lines are open from 1-7pm Monday to Friday on the freephone number 0808 800 4000 (only available in the UK).
    
    
  • Ask-A-Clay Scientist if you want to know more about clays, why they slide, how they can be used to make pots or ...?
    
    
  • For questions about crystals ask the BCA education webmaster [email protected]

Items from 'Crystallography News

• December 97 Minerals Word Square
• September 98
  Visitors to RAL 'Open Days' in June 1998 saw displays of crystals and tried their hand at a 'Jewel Colouring Competition'.
• September 97
  • Crystal Growing Competition for schools photo of winner
  • List of Nobel Prize winners associated with Crystallography
• December 2001
  • Half Term Activities in February 2001 at the Oxford University Museum of Natural History

other BCA activities

• The BCA has run Crystal Growing competitions and because crystals grow slowly has made a page of suggested activities associated with crystals for you to try.
• List of helpful books where you can find further information about crystals.
• Crystals on postage stamps
• toys and fun activities which help you learn about crystals or build your own models

• Fourier transforms used in Electrical Engineering in USA
• Kevin Cowtan's pages of Fourier transforms and Interactive Structure Factor Tutorial

• Electronic Nobel Museum with info on life and work of Nobel Laureates
  
• List of Nobel Prizewinners
  
• Crystallography World Wide pages on Teaching and Education

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