Multilevel modular mesocrystalline organization in red coral
-
Daniel Vielzeuf
,
Nicole Floquet
Abstract
Biominerals can achieve complex shapes as aggregates of crystalline building blocks. In the red coral skeleton, we observe that these building blocks are arranged into eight hierarchical levels of similarly (but not identically) oriented modules. The modules in each hierarchical level assemble into larger units that comprise the next higher level of the hierarchy, and consist themselves of smaller, oriented modules. EBSD and TEM studies show that the degree of crystallographic misorientation between the building blocks decreases with decreasing module size. We observe this organization down to a few nanometers. Thus, the transition from imperfect crystallographic order at millimeter scale to nearly perfect single crystalline domains at nanometer scale is progressive. The concept of “mesocrystal” involves the three-dimensional crystallographic organization of nanoparticles into a highly ordered mesostructure. We add to this concept the notion of “multilevel modularity.” This modularity has potential implications for the origin of complex biomineral shapes in nature. A multilevel modular organization with small intermodular misorientations combines a simple construction scheme, ruled by crystallographic laws, with the possibility of complex shapes. If the observations we have made on red coral extend to other biominerals, long-range crystallographic order and interfaces at all scales may be key to how some biominerals achieve complex shapes adapted to the environment in which they grow.
© 2015 by Walter de Gruyter Berlin/Boston
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Artikel in diesem Heft
- Brownleeite: A new manganese silicide mineral in an interplanetary dust particle
- Simulation of thermodynamic mixing properties of actinide-containing zircon solid solutions
- Multilevel modular mesocrystalline organization in red coral
- High-pressure behavior of 2M1 muscovite
- Chopinite-sarcopside solid solution, [(Mg,Fe)3□](PO4)2, in GRA95209, a transitional acapulcoite: Implications for phosphate genesis in meteorites
- Distribution of rare earth elements in lunar zircon
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- Site-specific infrared O-H absorption coefficients for water substitution into olivine
- High-pressure phase transition of a natural pigeonite
- Location and quantification of hydroxyl in wadsleyite: New insights
- Optical spectroscopic study of natural Fe-rich Pizzo Forno staurolite at different temperatures and pressures
- Metasideronatrite: Crystal structure and its relation with sideronatrite
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- REE diffusion in olivine
- Phase transition induced by solid solution: The BCa-BMg substitution in richteritic amphiboles
- Aiolosite, Na2(Na2Bi)(SO4)3Cl, a new sulfate isotypic to apatite from La Fossa Crater, Vulcano, Aeolian Islands, Italy
- Gayite, a new dufrénite-group mineral from the Gigante granitic pegmatite, Córdoba province, Argentina
- Galliskiite, Ca4Al2(PO4)2F8·5H2O, a new mineral from the Gigante granitic pegmatite, Córdoba province, Argentina
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- Evidence of dmisteinbergite (hexagonal form of CaAl2Si2O8) in pseudotachylyte: A tool to constrain the thermal history of a seismic event
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- Density functional calculation of the infrared spectrum of surface hydroxyl groups on goethite (α-FeOOH)
- X-ray diffraction and Mössbauer spectroscopy of Fe3+-bearing Mg-silicate post-perovskite at 128–138 GPa
