2D hyperbolic groups induce three-periodic Euclidean reticulations

Many crystalline networks can be viewed as decorations of triply periodic minimal surfaces. Such surfaces are covered by the hyperbolic plane in the same way that the Euclidean plane covers a cylinder. Thus, a symmetric hyperbolic network can be wrapped onto an appropriate minimal surface to obtain a 3d periodic net. This requires symmetries of the hyperbolic net to match the symmetries of the minimal surface. We describe a systematic algorithm to find all the hyperbolic symmetries that are commensurate with a given minimal surface, and the generation of simple 3d nets from these symmetry groups. Copyright Springer-Verlag Berlin/Heidelberg 2004