Lipscombite (Fe²⁺,Mn²⁺)(Fe³⁺)₂(PO₄)₂(OH)₂
/ref>Lipscombite data on WebMineral
/ref> is a green gray, olive green, or black. phosphate-based mineral containing

iron Iron () is a chemical element with symbol Fe (from la, ferrum) and atomic number 26. It is a metal that belongs to the first transition series and group 8 of the periodic table. It is, by mass, the most common element on Earth, right in f ...

manganese Manganese is a chemical element with the symbol Mn and atomic number 25. It is a hard, brittle, silvery metal, often found in minerals in combination with iron. Manganese is a transition metal with a multifaceted array of industrial alloy use ...

, and iron

phosphate In chemistry, a phosphate is an anion, salt, functional group or ester derived from a phosphoric acid. It most commonly means orthophosphate, a derivative of orthophosphoric acid . The phosphate or orthophosphate ion is derived from phospho ...

. Lipscombite is often formed at meteorite impact sites where its crystals are microscopically small, because crystal-forming conditions of pressure and temperature are brief. In the

Classification of non-silicate minerals This list gives an overview of the classification of non-silicate minerals and includes mostly International Mineralogical Association (IMA) recognized minerals and its groupings. This list complements the List of minerals recognized by the Intern ...

lipscombite is in the lipscombite group, which also includes zinclipscombite. This group is within the non-silicate, category 8, anhydrous phosphates, lazulite supergroup.

Discovery

The mineral lipscombite was first made artificially and then found in nature. It was named after chemist

William Lipscomb William Nunn Lipscomb Jr. (December 9, 1919April 14, 2011) was a Nobel Prize-winning American inorganic and organic chemist working in nuclear magnetic resonance, theoretical chemistry, boron chemistry, and biochemistry. Biography Overview L ...

by the mineralogist John W. Gruner who first made it artificially. While investigating the stability relations of iron oxides small, black, shiny crystals were obtained when a spherical iron pressure-temperature vessel was contaminated with

phosphorus Phosphorus is a chemical element with the symbol P and atomic number 15. Elemental phosphorus exists in two major forms, white phosphorus and red phosphorus, but because it is highly reactive, phosphorus is never found as a free element on Ear ...

. The x-ray

powder diffraction Powder diffraction is a scientific technique using X-ray, neutron, or electron diffraction on powder or microcrystalline samples for structural characterization of materials. An instrument dedicated to performing such powder measurements is call ...

pattern was similar to

lazulite Lazulite () is a blue, phosphate mineral containing magnesium, iron, and aluminium phosphate. Lazulite forms one endmember of a solid solution series with the darker iron rich scorzalite. Lazulite crystallizes in the monoclinic system. Crystal h ...

, but unknown. Gruner, a mineralogist at the

University of Minnesota The University of Minnesota, formally the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities, (UMN Twin Cities, the U of M, or Minnesota) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in the Minneapolis–Saint Paul, Tw ...

, gave Lipscomb, a chemistry professor there, the crystals for Lewis Katz and Lipscomb to determine the atomic structure using single-crystal x-ray diffraction. They initially called the mineral iron lazulite.

References

External links

Gallery o
lipscombite pictures
at mindat.org. Iron(II,III) minerals Manganese(II) minerals Phosphate minerals Tetragonal minerals Minerals in space group 96 {{phosphate-mineral-stub