Answer to Question #27339 in Inorganic Chemistry for anissa

Question

among these properties wich ones with respect to single crystals exhibit anisotropy:
specific heat, the transition temperature, the birefringence, the speed of crystal growth, the ferromagnetic property, dextrorotatory property.

Answer 1

Many types of single crystal exhibit anisotropy, that is, a variation ofsome of their physical properties according to the direction along which they are measured. For example, the electrical resistivity of a randomly oriented aggregate of graphite crystallites is the same in all directions. This anisotropy exists both for structure-sensitive properties, which are strongly affected by crystal imperfections (such as cleavage and crystal growth rate), and for structure-insensitive properties, which are not affected by imperfections (such as elastic coefficients).