Heamanite-(Ce), (K0.5Ce0.5)TiO3, a new perovskite supergroup mineral found in diamond from Gahcho Kué, Canada

Research output: Contribution to journalJournal articleResearchpeer-review

  • Chiara Anzolini
  • William K. Siva-Jothy
  • Andrew J. Locock
  • Fabrizio Nestola
  • Balic Zunic, Tonci
  • Matteo Alvaro
  • Ingrid L. Chinn
  • Thomas Stachel
  • D. Graham Pearson

Heamanite-(Ce) (IMA 2020-001), ideally (K0.5Ce0.5)TiO3, is a new perovskite-group mineral found as an inclusion in a diamond from the Gahcho Kué mine in the Northwest Territories, Canada. It occurs as brown, translucent single crystals with an average maximum dimension of ~80 μm, associated with rutile and calcite. The luster is adamantine, and the fracture conchoidal. Heamanite-(Ce) is the K-analog of loparite-(Ce), ideally (NaCe)Ti2O6. The Mohs hardness is estimated to be 5½ by comparison to loparite-(Ce), and the calculated density is 4.73(1) g/cm3. Electron microprobe wavelength-dispersive spectrometric analysis (average of 34 points) yielded: CaO 10.70, K2O 7.38, Na2O 0.16, Ce2O3 13.77, La2O3 8.22, Pr2O3 0.84, Nd2O3 1.59, SrO 6.69, BaO 2.96, ThO2 0.36, PbO 0.15, TiO2 45.77, Cr2O3 0.32, Al2O3 0.10, Fe2O3 0.09, Nb2O5 0.87, UO3 0.01, total 99.98 wt%. The empirical formula, based on 3 O atoms, is: [(K0.268Na0.009)ς0.277(Ce0.143La0.086Pr0.009Nd0.016)ς0.254(Ca0.326Sr0.110Ba0.033Pb0.001)ς0.470Th0.002]ς1.003 (Ti0.979Nb0.011Cr0.007Al0.003Fe0.002)ς1.002O3. The Goldschmidt tolerance factor for this formula is 1.003. Heamanite-(Ce) is cubic, space group Pm3m, with unit-cell parameter a = 3.9129(9) Å, and volume V = 59.91(4) Å3 (Z = 1). The crystal structure was solved using single-crystal X-ray diffraction data and refined to R1(F) = 2.61%. Heamanite-(Ce) has the aristotypic perovskite structure and adopts the same structure as isolueshite and tausonite. The six strongest diffraction lines are [dobs in angstroms (I in percentages) (hkl)]: 2.764 (100) (110), 1.954 (41) (200), 1.596 (36) (211), 1.045 (16) (321), 1.236 (13) (310), and 1.382 (10) (220). The Raman spectrum of heamanite-(Ce) shows two broad bands at 560 and 787 cm-1, with no bands observed above 1000 cm-1. Heamanite-(Ce) is named after Larry Heaman, a renowned scientist in the field of radiometric dating applied to diamond-bearing kimberlites, mantle-derived eclogites, and lamprophyre dikes. The dominant REE should appear as a Levinson suffix, hence heamanite-(Ce).

Original languageEnglish
JournalAmerican Mineralogist
Volume107
Issue number8
Pages (from-to)1635-1642
Number of pages8
ISSN0003-004X
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 2022

Bibliographical note

Publisher Copyright:
© 2022 Mineralogical Society of America.

    Research areas

  • crystal structure, diamond inclusion, Gahcho Kué, Heamanite-(Ce), loparite-(Ce), mantle, new mineral, perovskite

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