Quasicrystals and atomic clusters

Historically, two principal approaches exist to determine the quasicrystal atomic structures: one is derived directly from diffraction experiments, using cut and projection of higher dimensional space-representation techniques; the other one takes use of the similarity between so-called approximant crystalline phases, observed to co-exist with quasicrystals. The known structure of these phases is shown to be the starting point of building a quasicrystal model in terms of constitutive polyatomic clusters of icosahedral symmetry. It requires to apply inflation properties of quasiperiodicity, and decoration of elementary building tiles. One example is detailed and discussed, in terms of a two-cluster model, in the case of AlLiCu.