A NEW VIEW OF THE UNIT-CELL DIMENSIONS OF INTERMETALLIC PHASES

Previous limitations on the study of the unit-cell dimensions of binary intermetallic phases with given crystal structure types are discussed, and it is shown how these can now be avoided. The significant results are discussed for the new analytical methods, which are based on atomic diameters for coordination number 12 determined from elemental structures, and in which the precision of the studies is increased greatly and attention is paid to the Group and Period of the component atoms in the selection of subsets of the data of phases to be considered together. Examples are taken for phases with the MgCu//2(cF24), SiCr//3(CP8), and BaAl//4(tI10) structure types.