Abstract:

The properties of materials are determined by their structures. The research on structures is the basis and guidance of modern chemistry, material and biology, and the structure determination is an essential skill and method for scholars and students. X-ray diffraction is the most common method to investigate the structures of matter. However, current X-ray crystallography courses offered by Chinese universities were hindered by the limited capacities, the overemphasis on theories and the lack of practices, which cannot fulfill the need of students especially those who focused their research on non-crystallographic areas. Consequently, students find it difficult to obtain efficient and accurate support and guidance from existing resources and instructors, leaving a large gap between the requirement and supply when facing problems in X-ray structure determination. In this work, the current domestic situation of the popularization of X-ray crystallography was investigated. To improve the capabilities of X-ray structure determination for the teachers and students, the current teaching methods and contents of X-ray crystallography courses need to be reformed to be more practical to meet the needs of non-crystallographic users. Detailed suggestions were clarified for the improvement from three aspects: knowledge, skill, and confidence, and assigned the practical X-ray crystallography into three section: the principle of X-ray, introduction to crystallography, skills for X-ray diffraction data collection and structure refinement. We also need to improve students' confidence during processing the structure determination.

Key words: Practical X-ray crystallography, Determination of structures, Teaching method reformation