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Inorganic Crystal Structure Database: Home

Overview the database and access to it at MIT, including API access.

ICSD Introduction

ICSD (Inorganic Crystal Structure Database) provides the world's largest database for completely identified inorganic crystal structures, including minerals, metals, alloys and metal-organic.The first records date back to 1913. Currently, around 12,000 new structures are added every year. The curated data collection includes:

Most crystal structure data are available, including unit cell, space group, complete atomic parameters, site occupation factors, Wyckoff sequence, molecular formula and weight, ANX formula, mineral group, etc. Read more about the database on their About page and scientific manual.

MIT affiliates may access the database through the browser-based interface ICSD Web or use the ICSD API for programmatic access.

Access to ICSD and ICSD API

The MIT community (MIT faculty, students, post-docs & other researchers, and staff) are authorized to use ICSD for academic research purposes only.

  • Access through browser-based interface ICSD Web: https://libguides.mit.edu/icsd
     
  • Computational access via ICSD API
    MIT affiliates have access to ICSD API service via our site license. To request access to the ICSD API, please email icsd-api@mit.edu and include the following information in your message.
    • Your project title and a brief description
    • Estimated duration of API access needed
    • Your MIT email address

Each user will need to review and agree on the Terms and Conditions of ICSD API from ICSD. Here are a few terms to highlight.

  • The data can only be used for academic research and cannot be used to “calculate powder pattern collections for material identification or quantitation, or to make derivative databases for the aforementioned purposes”.
  • The dataset cannot be shared with anyone else outside your project.
  • The dataset needs to be deleted when you finish your project or when our license expires.

We have limited number of seats for ICSD API access. They will be allocated to users on first-come first-serviced basis with an expiration date based on individual project needs. If you need an extension of the access, please email icsd-api@mit.edu .

 

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