Structural Principles of Ion-Conducting Mineral-like Crystals with Tetrahedral, Octahedral, and Mixed Frameworks

Materials with high ion mobility are widely used in many fields of modern science and technology. Over the last 40 years, they have thoroughly changed our world. The paper characterizes the structural features of minerals and their synthetic analogs possessing this property. Special attention is paid to the ionic conductors with tetrahedral (zincite- and wurtzite-like), octahedral (ilmenite-like), and mixed (NASICON-like) frameworks. It is emphasized that the main conditions for fast ionic transport are related to the size and positions occupied by a mobile ion, their activation energy, the presence and diameter of conduction channels running inside the structure, isomorphic impurities, and other structural peculiarities. The results of the studies of solid electrolytes are dispersed in different editions, and the overview of new ideas related to their crystal structures was the focus of this paper.