Bravais lattice

Bravais lattice
In geometry and crystallography, a Bravais lattice, studied by Auguste Bravais(1850), is an infinite array of
discrete points generated by a set of discrete translation operations described by:

where ni are any integers and ai are known as the primitive vectors which lie in different directions and span the
lattice. This discrete set of vectors must be closed under vector addition and subtraction. For any choice of position
vector R, the lattice looks exactly the same.
A crystal is made up of a periodic arrangement of one or more atoms (the basis) repeated at each lattice point.
Consequently, the crystal looks the same when viewed from any equivalent lattice point, namely those separated by
the translation of one unit cell (the motive).
Two Bravais lattices are often considered equivalent if they have isomorphic symmetry groups. In this sense, there
are 14 possible Bravais lattices in three-dimensional space. The 14 possible symmetry groups of Bravais lattices are
14 of the 230 space groups.

Bravais lattices in at most 2 dimensions

In each of 0-dimensional and 1-dimensional space there is just one type of Bravais lattice.
In two dimensions, there are five Bravais lattices, called oblique, rectangular, centered rectangular (rhombic),
hexagonal, and square.

The five fundamental two-dimensional Bravais lattices: 1 oblique, 2 rectangular, 3 centered rectangular (rhombic), 4 hexagonal, and 5 square. In
addition to the stated conditions, the centered rectangular lattice fulfills
. This orthogonality condition leads to the rectangular
pattern indicated and implies

Bravais lattice

Bravais lattices in 3 dimensions

The 14 Bravais lattices in 3 dimensions are obtained by coupling one of the 7 lattice systems (or axial systems) with
one of the lattice centerings. Each Bravais lattice refers to a distinct lattice type.
The lattice centerings are:

Primitive (P): lattice points on the cell corners only.

Body (I): one additional lattice point at the center of the cell.
Face (F): one additional lattice point at the center of each of the faces of the cell.
Base (A, B or C): one additional lattice point at the center of each of one pair of the cell faces.

Not all combinations of the crystal systems and lattice centerings are needed to describe the possible lattices. There
are in total 76 = 42 combinations, but it can be shown that several of these are in fact equivalent to each other. For
example, the monoclinic I lattice can be described by a monoclinic C lattice by different choice of crystal axes.
Similarly, all A- or B-centred lattices can be described either by a C- or P-centering. This reduces the number of
combinations to 14 conventional Bravais lattices, shown in the table below.
The 7 lattice systems

The 14 Bravais lattices

Triclinic

Monoclinic

Orthorhombic

Tetragonal

Rhombohedral

Hexagonal

Bravais lattice

3
Cubic

P (pcc)

I (bcc)

F (fcc)

The volume of the unit cell can be calculated by evaluating a b c where a, b, and c are the lattice vectors. The
volumes of the Bravais lattices are given below:
Lattice system

Volume

Triclinic
Monoclinic
Orthorhombic
Tetragonal
Rhombohedral
Hexagonal

Cubic

Centred Unit Cells :

Lattice
System

Possible Variations

Axial Distances (edge

lengths)

Axial Angles

Examples

Cubic

Primitive, Body-centred, Face-centred

a=b=c

= = = 90

NaCl, Zinc Blende, Cu

Tetragonal

Primitive, Body-centred

a=bc

= = = 90

White tin, SnO2, TiO2, CaSO4

Orthorhombic

Primitive, Body-centred, Face-centred,

Base-centred

abc

= = = 90

Rhombic sulphur, KNO3,

BaSO4

Hexagonal

Primitive

a=bc

= = 90, =
120

Graphite, ZnO, CdS

Rhombohedral

Primitive

a=b=c

= = 90

Calcite (CaCO3), Cinnabar

(HgS)

Monoclinic

Primitive, Base-centred

abc

= = 90,
90

Monoclinic sulphur,
Na2SO4.10H2O

Triclinic

Primitive

abc

90

K2Cr2O7, CuSO4.5H2O, H3BO3

Bravais lattice

Bravais lattices in 4 dimensions

In four dimensions, there are 64 Bravais lattices. Of these, 23 are primitive and 41 are centered. Ten Bravais lattices
split into enantiomorphic pairs.

References
Further reading
Bravais, A. (1850). "Mmoire sur les systmes forms par les points distribus rgulirement sur un plan ou dans
l'espace". J. Ecole Polytech. 19: 1128. (English: Memoir 1, Crystallographic Society of America, 1949.)
Hahn, Theo, ed. (2002). International Tables for Crystallography, Volume A: Space Group Symmetry (http://it.
iucr.org/A/) A (5th ed.). Berlin, New York: Springer-Verlag. doi: 10.1107/97809553602060000100 (http://dx.
doi.org/10.1107/97809553602060000100). ISBN978-0-7923-6590-7.

External links
Smith, Walter Fox (2002). "The Bravais Lattices Song" (http://www.haverford.edu/physics-astro/songs/
bravais.htm).

Article Sources and Contributors

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