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Nixonite, Na2Ti6O13, a new mineral from a metasomatized mantle garnet pyroxenite from the western Rae Craton, Darby kimberlite field, Canada

  • Chiara Anzolini EMAIL logo , Fei Wang , Garrett A. Harris , Andrew J. Locock , Dongzhou Zhang , Fabrizio Nestola , Luca Peruzzo , Steven D. Jacobsen and D. Graham Pearson
Published/Copyright: August 28, 2019
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American Mineralogist
From the journal American Mineralogist Volume 104 Issue 9

Abstract

Nixonite (IMA 2018-133), ideally Na2Ti6O13, is a new mineral found within a heavily metasomatized pyroxenite xenolith from the Darby kimberlite field, beneath the west-central Rae Craton, Canada. It occurs as microcrystalline aggregates, 15 to 40 mm in length. Nixonite is isostructural with jeppeite, K2Ti6O13, with a structure consisting of edge- and corner-shared titanium-centered octahedra that enclose alkali-metal ions. The Mohs hardness is estimated to be between 5 and 6 by comparison to jeppeite, and the calculated density is 3.51(1) g/cm3. Electron microprobe wavelength-dispersive spectroscopic analysis (average of 6 points) yielded: Na2O 6.87, K2O 5.67, CaO 0.57, TiO2 84.99, V2O3 0.31, Cr2O3 0.04, MnO 0.01, Fe2O3 0.26, SrO 0.07, total 98.79 wt%. The empirical formula, based on 13 O atoms, is: (Na1.24K0.67Ca0.06)S1.97(Ti5.96V0.023Fe0.018)S6.00O13 with minor amounts of Cr and Mn. Nixonite is monoclinic, space group C2/m, with unit-cell parameters a = 15.3632(26) Å, b = 3.7782(7) Å, c = 9.1266(15) Å, b = 99.35(15)°, and V = 522.72(1) Å3, Z = 2. Based on the average of seven integrated multi-grain diffraction images, the strongest diffraction lines are [dobs in Å (I in %) (hkl)]: 3.02 (100) (310), 3.66 (75) (110), 7.57 (73) (200), 6.31 (68) (201), 2.96 (63) (311), 2.96 (63) (203), and 2.71 (62) (402). The five main Raman peaks of nixonite, in order of decreasing intensity, are at 863, 280, 664, 135, and 113 cm–1. Nixonite is named after Peter H. Nixon, a renowned scientist in the field of kimberlites and mantle xenoliths. Nixonite occurs within a pyroxenite xenolith in a kimberlite, in association with rutile, priderite, perovskite, freudenbergite, and ilmenite. This complex Na-K-Ti-rich metasomatic mineral assemblage may have been produced by a fractionated Na-rich kimberlitic melt that infiltrated a mantle-derived garnet pyroxenite and reacted with rutile during kimberlite crystallization.

Keywords: Nixonite; new mineral; crystal structure; jeppeite; mantle xenolith; kimberlite; Rae Craton

Orcid 0000-0002-6679-892X

Orcid 0000-0002-4875-5125

Orcid 0000-0001-8166-9416

Acknowledgments

We thank Gerhard Brey, A.L. Jaques, and an anonymous reviewer for suggestions that led to the improvement of the manuscript, and Paolo Lotti for careful editorial handling.

  1. Funding

    This research was financially supported by a Canada Excellence Research Chair (CERC) grant to D. G.P., and by the Diamond Exploration and Research Training School (DERTS), both funded by NSERC. S.D.J. acknowledges support from the U. S. National Science Foundation (NSF) EAR-1853521. We acknowledge Teck Resources Limited for granting access to the Darby property and support with field costs. Mike Merante provided invaluable assistance in the field. Work performed at GSECARS (sector 13) of the Advanced Photon Source (APS) is supported by the NSF EAR-1634415 and the Department of Energy (DOE) DEFG02-94ER1446. The APS is operated for the DOE Office of Science by Argonne National Laboratory under Contract No. DE-AC02-06CH11357. Experiments at Sector 13-BM-C of the APS used the PX2 facility, supported by COMPRES under NSF Cooperative Agreement EAR-1661511.

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Received: 2019-02-25
Accepted: 2019-05-17
Published Online: 2019-08-28
Published in Print: 2019-09-25

© 2019 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston

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  14. Goldschmidtite, (K,REE,Sr)(Nb,Cr)O3: A new perovskite supergroup mineral found in diamond from Koffiefontein, South Africa
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https://doi.org/10.2138/am-2019-7023
Keywords for this article
Nixonite; new mineral; crystal structure; jeppeite; mantle xenolith; kimberlite; Rae Craton

Articles in the same Issue

  1. Highlights and Breakthroughs
  2. Seeking the most hydrous, primitive arc melts: The glass is half full
  3. Hydrous LABZ beneath a subduction zone was reconstructed for the first time
  4. U, Th, and K partitioning between metal, silicate, and sulfide and implications for Mercury’s structure, volatile content, and radioactive heat production
  5. Valleyite: A new magnetic mineral with the sodalite-type structure
  6. An analysis of the magnetic behavior of olivine and garnet substitutional solid solutions
  7. Pyrite trace-element and sulfur isotope geochemistry of paleo-mesoproterozoic McArthur Basin: Proxy for oxidative weathering
  8. Compressional behavior and spin state of δ-(Al,Fe)OOH at high pressures
  9. Reconstruction of the lithosphere-asthenosphere boundary zone beneath Ichinomegata maar, Northeast Japan, by geobarometry of spinel peridotite xenoliths
  10. High-pressure phase stability and elasticity of ammonia hydrate
  11. A multi-methodological study of kurnakovite: A potential B-rich aggregate
  12. Identification of the occurrence of minor elements in the structure of diatomaceous opal using FIB and TEM-EDS
  13. Nixonite, Na2Ti6O13, a new mineral from a metasomatized mantle garnet pyroxenite from the western Rae Craton, Darby kimberlite field, Canada
  14. Goldschmidtite, (K,REE,Sr)(Nb,Cr)O3: A new perovskite supergroup mineral found in diamond from Koffiefontein, South Africa
  15. Edscottite, Fe5C2, a new iron carbide mineral from the Ni-rich Wedderburn IAB iron meteorite
  16. Letter
  17. The stability of Fe5O6 and Fe4O5 at high pressure and temperature
  18. New Mineral Names
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