This discovery was made by a group of researchers, which included scientists scientists from St. Petersburg state University (SPbSU).
A scientific expedition during the study of the Mineralogy of the fumaroles of Tolbachik volcano on the Kamchatka Peninsula have revealed two new minerals that have arisen from volcanic gases, and asmiranda and lamanna. Previously it was thought that similar in structure and composition of minerals can be obtained only in laboratory conditions, so the new discovery should help in the creation of methods of synthesis of new materials and the study of migration of metals in geological systems.
"In the laboratory, polyoxometallate are synthesized, generally, from aqueous solutions, although they can be obtained from other liquids, in particular ionic liquids. Education polyoxometallates from the gas phase — a rather unusual process. That is why the discovery of minerals of asmirandah and Lamanite has a special significance", — said the head of the Department of crystallography, SPbSU Professor Sergey Krivovichev.
Minerals exhalative origin (crystals were grown from the volcanic gases that rose to the surface and interacted with the atmosphere and lower temperatures) have a unique crystal structure with nano-size metal-oxygen clusters. Both have polyoxometallate clusters, which in armangite is an atom of iron, in Lamanite Titan, surrounded by eight oxygen atoms, which are surrounded by twelve copper atoms at the vertices of cuboctahedra.
"This so-called metal-oxygen core of the cluster, which is covered on all sides eight arsenate groups, and this completes the construction of a complete cluster. Clusters themselves are laid in the structure in a three-dimensional staggered, and between them there are atoms of sodium and chlorine. We can say that the mineral structure is a natural location polyoxometallate clusters in the structure of halite — rock salt", — said Sergey Krivovichev.
As stressed by the authors, published in the journal Scientific Reports, the discovery of minerals change scientists ‘ ideas about the mobility of different elements under natural conditions and will help staff build synthetic clusters with copper, which in otlichae from polyoxovanadates — polyoxometallates with the precious metal palladium in the laboratory could be obtained.
