IUCr news digest 6 June 2014

The first formal commemoration of IYCr2014 in Malaysia was held recently at the University of Malaya in Kuala Lumpur. The guest of honour and keynote speaker of the symposium was the President of the IUCr, Professor Gautam R. Desiraju. In the first of two addresses, Professor Desiraju stressed the importance of Malaysia’s participation in the IUCr. The event was attended by approximately 70 participants who enjoyed presentations covering the state-of-the-art thinking on the topic "Crystal Engineering – From Molecule to Crystal".

Continuing on the theme of the International Year of Crystallography, can you suggest a new crystallography teaching aid? As part of IUCr’s commitment to supporting activities relating to teaching crystallography, a comprehensive directory of teaching resources in crystallography is being assembled. If you can suggest a useful web page, resource or similar, simply follow this link to upload the details.

You can learn about crystallography and the history of crystallography through watching some interesting video clips, webcasts, television programmes and films. We hope you enjoy our growing library of clips. Similarly, if you come across any interesting crystallography-related videos, please let us know by sending an email to [email protected] and we will consider including the video on our page.

The latest issue of Acta Crystallographica Section B: Structural Science, Crystal Engineering and Materials is now available to readers. This particular issue is a special issue highlighting the popular field of non-ambient crystallography and is guest-edited by Professor David G. Billing, University of Witwatersrand, South Africa and Professor Andrzej Katrusiak, Adam Mickiewicz University, Poland. In their editorial [Acta Cryst. (2014). B70, 399-400; doi: 10.1107/S2052520614012323], the guest editors comment, "It is our hope that the publication will not only stimulate new research in all areas of non-ambient crystallography, but also that it would encourage publication of these results within Section B." The editors went on to say, "Clearly non-ambient crystallography is a far broader field than can be done justice in a single Special Issue. The contents of this issue merely represent a small sampling of what is possible, we encourage you to read the issue and submit your contributions to the journal."

And finally don’t forget to view some of the pictures from our recent trip to the American Crystallographic Association Annual Meeting last week in Albuquerque. An excellent meeting was had by all and congratulations go to this year’s Award Winners, Professor John Helliwell – Patterson Award, Professor Borden Lacy – Etter Early Career Award, and Professor Dan Rabinovich – Wood Writing Award. The 2015 American Crystallographic Association Annual Meeting will be held in Philadelphia, PA, USA 25-29 July 2015.