Dear Students!
Welcome to Chapter 2 of our Crystal MOOC!
We will start with a virtual flight through the Mineralogical Museum of the University of Hamburg, will discuss the outer shapes of crystals, Miller indices, the Bravais lattices, and fractional coordinates. Furthermore, we introduce VESTA, an incredible piece of software (freeware), which allows you to analyze crystal structures, to build your own crystals structures and crystal shapes!
Peer-to-Peer Homework and Optional Assignment
With the beginning of this chapter you are invited to take part in the first P2P assignment. You will find an explanation how this works on the frontpage of the Homework unit (‘How Does Evaluation Work’).
The due dates for the P2P homework “Miller Indices” are as follows:
Submission Deadline: 07.11.2014, 23:59 (CET, Berlin)
Evaluation Deadline: 14.11.2014, 23.59 (CET, Berlin).
In addition to the P2P homework there is a further optional task (in Unit 2.4), which you can discuss within your learning groups or also in the discussion forum. The solution will be made available later during the course.
In general, we would like to encourage you to use the forum: tell your classmates about your interest in crystals, discuss topics with your peers, ask questions, look for interesting links and post them or perhaps even arrange a local meetup with others! Don’t be shy! 🙂
Certificate Track
For those of you, who decided to choose the Certificate Track (you still have one week to upgrade from the Audit Free Track) there will be a final online proctored exam in form of an extended multiple choice test. This exam will be activated two weeks after the release of the last chapter, i.e. at the 11th of December, and you can participate at the latest until the 19th of December.
Crystal MOOC’s flickr page
We have created a flickr account for the Crystal MOOC community! The idea is, that we build together a beautiful collection of photos, dedicated to specific crystallographic topics, which will then be categorized in albums. In Unit 2.7 you are asked to upload photos/screenshots of crystal structures and shapes you created with VESTA.
The flickr page can be found at:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/100542173@N05/
You can upload a photo to this page by sending an eMail with the picture attached to:clear12report@photos.flickr.com.
The subject of the mail serves automatically as the title and the body as the description of the picture (please indicate your name here).
Have a nice week!
kind regards
Michael and Frank
The Fascination of Crystals and Symmetry 