The crystal structure of ammoniojarosite, (NH_4)Fe_3(SO_4)_2(OH)_6 and the crystal chemistry of the ammoniojarosite-hydronium jarosite solid-solution series

摘要

The atomic structure of ammoniojarosite, [(NH_4)Fe_3(SO_4)_2(OH)_6], a = 7.3177(3) A, c = 17.534(1) A, space group R3-bar m, Z = 3, has been solved using single-crystal X-ray diffraction (XRD) to wR 3.64 percent and R 1.4 percent, The atomic coordinates of the hydrogen atoms of the NH_4 group were located and it was found that the ammonium group has two different orientations with equal probability. Hydronium commonly substitutes into jarosite group mineral structures and samples in the ammoniojarosite-hydronium jarosite solid-solution series were synthesized and analysed using powder XRD and Rietveld refinement. Changes in unit-cell dimensions and bond lengths are noted across the solid-solution series. The end-member ammoniojarosite synthesized in this study has no hydronium substitution in the A site and the unit-cell dimensions determined have a smaller a dimension and larger c dimension than previous studies. Two natural ammoniojarosite samples were analysed and shown to have similar unit-cell dimensions to the synthetic samples. Short-wave infrared and Fourier transform infrared spectra were collected for samples from the NH_4-H_3O jarosite solid-solution series and the differences between the end-members were significant. Both are useful tools for determining NH_4 content in jarosite group minerals.