Refinement of the crystal structure of sieleckiite and revision of its symmetry

Abstract

AbstractThe crystal structure of the copper aluminium phosphate mineral sieleckiite, Cu3Al4(PO4)2 (OH)12·2H2O, from the Mt Oxide copper mine, Queensland, Australia was solved from single-crystal X-ray diffraction data utilizing synchrotron radiation. Sieleckiite has monoclinic rather than triclinic symmetry as previously reported and is space group C2/m with unit-cell parameters a = 11.711(2), b = 6.9233(14), c = 9.828(2) Å, β = 92.88(3)°, V = 795.8(3) Å3and Z = 2. The crystal structure, which has been refined to R1 = 0.0456 on the basis of 1186 unique reflections with Fo > 4σF, is a framework of corner-, edge- and face- sharing Cu and Al octahedra and PO4 tetrahedra.