TY - JOUR A1 - Stawski, Tomasz A1 - Smales, Glen Jacob A1 - Scoppola, E. A1 - Jha, D. A1 - Morales, L. F. G. A1 - Moya, A. A1 - Wirth, R. A1 - Pauw, Brian Richard A1 - Emmerling, Franziska A1 - Van Driessche, A. E. S. T1 - Seeds of imperfection rule the mesocrystalline disorder in natural anhydrite single crystals JF - Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America (PNAS) N2 - In recent years, we have come to appreciate the astounding intricacies associated with the formation of minerals from ions in aqueous solutions. In this context, a number of studies have revealed that the nucleation of calcium sulfate systems occurs nonclassically, involving the aggregation and reorganization of nanosized prenucleation species. In recent work, we have shown that this particle-mediated nucleation pathway is actually imprinted in the resultant micrometer-sized CaSO4 crystals. This property of CaSO4 minerals provides us with the unique opportunity to search for evidence of nonclassical nucleation pathways in geological environments. In particular, we focused on large anhydrite Crystals extracted from the Naica Mine in Mexico. We were able to shed light on this mineral's growth history by mapping defects at different length scales. Based on this, we argue that the nanoscale misalignment of the structural subunits, observed in the initial calcium sulfate crystal seeds, propagates through different length scales both in morphological, as well as in strictly crystallographic aspects, eventually causing the formation of large mesostructured single crystals of anhydrite. Hence, the nonclassical nucleation mechanism introduces a “seed of imperfection,” which leads to a macroscopic “single” crystal whose fragments do not fit together at different length scales in a self-similar manner. Consequently, anisotropic voids of various sizes are formed with very welldefined walls/edges. However, at the same time, the material retains in part its single crystal nature. KW - Calcium sulfate KW - Anhydrite KW - Mesocrystal KW - Nucleation KW - Naica PY - 2021 DO - https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2111213118 SN - 0027-8424 VL - 118 IS - 48 SP - 1 EP - 11 PB - National Academy of Sciences (USA) CY - Washington AN - OPUS4-53820 LA - eng AD - Bundesanstalt fuer Materialforschung und -pruefung (BAM), Berlin, Germany ER -