Abstract
Since naturally occurring minerals typically have particle sizes from microns to several nanometers, their investigation, from sampling to individual particle analysis, is a challenging task. This work reports the detection of anatase, which occurs mainly in tropical soils and upon weathering in laterite. Little knowledge of this omnipresent accessory nanomineral, showing strong affinity to the soil formation processes and lateritic profiles is presently available. In bauxites the nano-anatase crystal morphology have not been reported yet. The samples were collected in a bauxite mine south of the Amazon (Juruti, Brazil). The chemical enrichment of anatase was carried out with H2TiF6 and the resulting powders could be characterized with SEM, XRPD and EDX. Subsequently, transmission electron microscopy (TEM) was used to analyze the chemical composition of individual anatase particles by EDX and the unique method of automated electron diffraction tomography (ADT), which probes the reciprocal space of individual nanoparticles. Associated with anatase, crandallite mineral group was also detected. Keywords: kaolinite; iron oxyhydroxides; gorceixite; goyazite; Juruti
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