INTERNATIONAL UNION OF Crystallography NEWSLETTER www.iucr.org Volume 21, Number 4 ♦ 2013 APPLY SMART SENSITIVITY CONTROL Confidence means a detector that automatically optimizes its sensitivity for every sample you investigate. Agilent’s new Eos S2, Atlas S2, and Titan S2 CCD detectors employ groundbreaking Smart Sensitivity Control, which maximizes data quality by intelligently tuning detector sensitivity to match the strength of the data observed. Combined with up to 2x faster readout times and instantly switching hardware binning, the S2 range redefines expectations for X-ray diffraction detector performance. Learn how to apply Agilent S2 detectors and Smart Sensitivity Control to your research at www.agilent.com/chem/S2CCD. ACADEMIC & INSTITUTIONAL RESEARCH Agilent is a Proud Global Partner of the International Year of Crystallography Agilent supports a variety of IYCr2014 activities for advancing crystallography worldwide. Learn more at www.agilent.com/chem/iycr2014. © Agilent Technologies, Inc. 2013 LETTER FROM THE PRESIDENT TABLE OF CONTENTS The International Year of Crystallography has arrived after LETTER FROM THE PRESIDENT ..................1 much anticipation and I extend my wishes to all our readers for a fulfilling and productive 2014. This year will re-define IUCR JOURNALS .................................2 our identity as crystallographers and convey our identity to IYCR2014 .....................................4 the world. The IYCr should facilitate good science every- CRYSTALLOGRAPHIC MEETING REPORTS ......9 where and emphasize to youngsters the meaning and reasons for doing science. MILESTONES ...................................22 The opening ceremony of IYCr2014 will be held at the FUTURE MEETINGS ......................22, C4 Gautam R. Desiraju UNESCO headquarters in Paris on 20th and 21st January, NEWS AND NOTICES ..........................23 2014. The program has a lecture by Nobel laureate Brian Ko- INDEX TO ADVERTISERS.......................24 bilka and a talk on the past, present and future of crystallography by Jenny Glusker. Presentations on crystallography on Mars, a session on the BRICS countries and a CRYSTAllOGRAPHIC MEETINGS CALENDAR 4. 2 special highlight on the contributions of young scientists from all over the world Editor are also planned. Young crystallographers from the Ivory Coast, South Africa, Saudi Arabia, Bangladesh, South Korea, Argentina, Poland and Denmark will speak and William L. Duax then participate in a panel discussion. Please treat this as a personal invitation to at- [email protected] tend the opening ceremony. The program of open labs is in full swing with the active involvement of all major Newsletter Design & Production vendors of crystallographic equipment. Many labs are confirmed and Claude Lecomte, Patricia Potter IUCr Vice President is coordinating the entire open lab effort. The summit meetings in Karachi (chemical crystallography), Campinas (macromolecular crystallography) Assistant Editor Jane Griffin and Bloemfontein (powder diffraction) are now confirmed. These meetings are open to all interested crystallographers and if you would like to attend, please visit the Send Contributions to IUCr website. A crystal-growing competition for school children from every part of [email protected] the world is also planned. This initiative is coordinated by Luc Van Meervelt, IUCr www.iucr.org General Secretary and Treasurer. All countries are invited to participate in and to start their own national competitions. In India, we have brought out regional language Matters pertaining to Advertisements brochures in parallel to the English language version of “Crystallography Matters”, should be addressed to P. Potter at the above address. and the translation effort has spread with versions in German, French and in the four important languages of the Balkans already on the anvil. On the Cover and Page 5: Loperamide A significant recent development is the formation of the Latin American Crys- crystals [credit: Annie Cavanagh and David tallographic Association (LACA) at a meeting of Latin American crystallographers McCarthy, Wellcome Images (wellcomeim- in Cordoba, Argentina. This ties into the IUCr’s recent decision to intiate a program ages.org/)] and UNESCO photos (© UNESCO/ Michel Ravassard). for Latin America on the lines of our Africa program. Crystallographers from Bra- zil, Argentina and Mexico are playing a lead role but many other countries such as Contributors: A. Bacchi, C. Ballard, Venezuela, Uruguay, Chile, Cuba, Peru and Colombia are involved too. Jose Sabino N. Bathori, T. Berfors, P. Beurskens, (Brazil), Diego Lamas (Argentina) and Lauro Bucio (Mexico) are office bearers of a E. Boldyreva, A. Bond, N. Brisson, M. Brunelli, provisonal body that will draft a constitution for LACA, which will hopefully ap- K. Chapman, J. Cherfils, M. Colmont, M. Dacombe, M. De Boissieu, B. Dittrich, proach the IUCr to become a regional associate and thus join the ranks of ACA, ECA F. Fabbiani, Y. Filinchuk, C.S. Frampton, and AsCA. At Cordoba I found the message of crystallography firmly in place and J. Gavira, S. Grabowsky, S. Grangeon, A. Guerri, feel that the future of crystallography is in Latin America, Africa and the Asia-Pacific. J.R. Helliwell, R.E. Johnsen, A. Katrusiak, Most of the activities for a successful year will be done at the regional level with B. Klaholz, T. Koetzle, L. Kroon-Batenburg, our regional associates, at the national level through your country organizations, at V. Lamzi, S. Larsen, B. Lazic, C. Lecomte, R. Loris, A. Mazzone, G. Montoya, M. Nespolo, the institutional level, and finally at the individual level. A number of institutional K.-M. Park, J.M. Perez-Mato, C. Rajnak, and individual efforts are already in place. What I would like to see is that they are S.E. Rasmussen, A. Reger, P. Roversi, recorded in the IYCr website. I request you to get in contact with Michele Zema P. Roversi, N. Sakabe, C. Schwalbe, O. Siidra, ([email protected]) about whatever you have done or are planning to do. It is up to each H. Walden, O. Yakubovich, and M. Zema. and every one of you to organize something, however small it may be, so that we can spread the message of our wonderful subject to people who will receive it well and IUCr Executive Secretary to whom the message will make a difference. Michael Dacombe ([email protected]) International Union of Crystallography GAUTAM R. DESIRAJU ([email protected]) 2 Abbey Square, Chester, CH1 2HU, England The International Union of Crystallography Newsletter is distributed by print to 585 libraries The International Union of Crystallography Newsletter and various crystallographic meetings and electronically to 12,000 crystallographers and other (ISSN 1067-0696; coden IUC-NEB) Volume 21, Number interested individuals in 102 countries. The IUCr also runs Crystallography Online, available 4. Published quarterly (4x) by the International Union of at www.iucr.org, as a complement to the IUCr print newsletter. Feature articles, meeting an- nouncements and reports, information on research or other items of potential interest to crys- Crystallography. Members receive the IUCr Newsletter by tallographers should be submitted to the editor at any time. Submission of text and images by virtue of country membership in the IUCr. POSTMASTER: electronic mail is requested. Items will be selected for publication on the basis of suitability, Please send changes of address to IUCr Newsletter Editorial content, style, timeliness and appeal. The editor reserves the right to edit. Address changes or Office, c/o Hauptman-Woodward Medical Research Inst., 700 corrections and requests to be added to the mailing list can be made at www.iucr.org/news/ Ellicott St., Buffalo, NY 14203 USA. newsletter. IUCr Newsletter ♦ Volume 21, Number 4 ♦ 2013 1 IUCR JOURNALS http://journals.iucr.org Acta Cryst. (2013). A69, 533–534 (http://doi.org/qc9) A new vision for Acta Crystallographica Section A S.J.L. BIllINGE AND J. MIAO We are making some exciting alterations to Acta A to reflect the chang- ing landscape of materials-structure research and emerging developments in the field. The subtitle will change from Foundations of Crystallography to Foundations and Advances, and a new Advances section will be created to ac- commodate articles describing original research of high potential impact. Simon Billinge (left) and John Miao, Manuscripts in this section will be `fast-tracked’, and certain of these will Section Editors of Acta A. be promoted to a wider audience using commissioned viewpoint articles and press releases. Furthermore, Advances review articles will be invited, capturing the state of play in an emerging area of structure science. Acta Cryst. (2013). B69, 465–473 (http://doi.org/qdb) X-ray diffraction: a powerful tool to probe and understand the structure of nanocrystalline calcium silicate hydrates S. GRANGEON, F. CLARET, Y. LINArd AND C. CHIABErgE Nanocrystalline calcium silicate hydrate (C-S-H) is the main binding phase in concrete. Despite decades of studies, many aspects of its lamellar structure remain unknown, owing to its minute size and extreme structural disorder, both producing X-ray diffraction Sketch of the layer structure from tobermorite patterns often considered diagnostic for X-ray amorphous phase. (top) and jennite (bottom), two model minerals However, closer investigation of these patterns strongly suggests that commonly used to describe C-S-H crystal chem- istry. Yellow polygons and purple tetrahedra C-S-H resembles nanocrystalline