Use of frit-disc crucibles for routine and exploratory solution growth of single crystalline samples

Abstract

Solution growth of single crystals from high temperature solutions often involves the separation of residual solution from the grown crystals. For many growths of intermetallic compounds, this separation has historically been achieved with the use of plugs of silica wool. Whereas this is generally efficient in a mechanical sense, it leads to a significant contamination of the decanted liquid with silica fibres. In this paper, we present a simple design for frit-disc alumina crucible sets that has made their use in the growth single crystals from high temperature solutions both simple and affordable. An alumina frit-disc allows for the clean separation of the residual liquid from the solid phase. This allows for the reuse of the decanted liquid, either for further growth of the same phase, or for subsequent growth of other, related phases. In this paper, we provide examples of the growth of isotopically substituted TbCd and icosahedral i-RCd quasicrystals, as well as the separation of (i) the closely related and phases and (ii) and .