TY - JOUR A1 - Liu, X. A1 - Michalchuk, Adam A1 - Bhattacharya, Biswajit A1 - Emmerling, Franziska A1 - Pulham, C. T1 - High-pressure reversibility in a plastically flexible coordination polymer crystal N2 - Single crystals which exhibit mechanical flexibility are promising materials for advanced technological applications. Before such materials can be used, a detailed understanding of the mechanisms of bending is needed. Using single crystal X-ray diffraction and microfocus Raman spectroscopy, we study in atomic detail the high-pressure response of the plastically flexible coordination polymer [Zn(μ-Cl)2(3,5-dichloropyridine)2]n (1). Contradictory to three-point bending, quasi-hydrostatic compression of (1) is completely reversible, even following compression to over 9 GPa. A structural phase transition is observed at ca. 5 GPa. DFT calculations show this transition to result from the pressure-induced softening of low-frequency vibrations. This phase transition is not observed during three-point-bending. Microfocus synchrotron X-ray diffraction revealed that bending yields significant mosaicity, as opposed to compression. Hence, our studies indicate of overall disparate mechanical responses of bulk flexibility and quasi-hydrostatic compression within the same crystal lattice. We suspect this to be a general feature of plastically bendable materials. KW - High pressure KW - Density functional theory KW - Mechanically flexible crystals PY - 2021 U6 - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:kobv:b43-530360 VL - 12 IS - 1 SP - 3871 AN - OPUS4-53036 LA - eng AD - Bundesanstalt fuer Materialforschung und -pruefung (BAM), Berlin, Germany ER -