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Five-fold symmetry in chrysotile asbestos revealed by transmission electron microscopy

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 July 2018

Barbara A. Cressey  and
Eric J. W. Whittaker
Barbara A. Cressey
Affiliation:
Department of Geology, University of Southampton, SO9 5NH, U.K.
Eric J. W. Whittaker
Affiliation:
Department of Earth Sciences, University of Oxford, OX1 3PR, U.K.
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Abstract

The structure of chrysotile, an important asbestos mineral, consists of layers curled concentrically or spirally into tubes. Published transmission electron microscope (TEM) images suggest that successive layers are generally stacked out of register with one another. However, a lattice model can be constructed in such a way that each layer can be stacked in register with the next, five times around the circumference, so that the structure exhibits a global 5-fold symmetry. We report here TEM observations confirming that chrysotile asbestos can form crystals with this structure, the first observation of five-fold symmetry in a natural crystalline material.

Keywords

chrysotileasbestostransmission electron microscopyfive-fold symmetry
Type
Mineralogy
Information
Mineralogical Magazine , Volume 57 , Issue 389 , December 1993 , pp. 729 - 732
Copyright
Copyright © The Mineralogical Society of Great Britain and Ireland 1993

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References

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