On the coordination of Mg2+ in aragonite: Ab-initio absorption spectroscopy and isotope fractionation study

Abstract

Listen

Translate article

Magnesium in biogenic aragonite skeletons is widely used to infer the geochemical conditions under which the minerals precipitated. However, because molecular speciation of Mg2+ in the aragonite crystal structure remains uncertain, questions are often posed about the reliability and utility of Mg as a paleoenvironment proxy. In this study, we investigated the Mg2+ coordination in abiogenic aragonite by applying first-principles density functional theory (DFT). We report for the first time a Mg2+-site disordered structure model of aragonite: substituted Mg2+ is five-fold coordinated and induces substantial disorder in the bond distances that depends on the relative positions of Mg2+ sites. Using the site disorder model, DFT qualitatively reproduces the key features of experimental Mg K-edge X-ray absorption near-edge structure (XANES) spectra of aragonite. DFT also resolves a long-standing conflict between experimental and theoretical studies pertaining to the enrichment of 26Mg in aragonite relative to calcite. The Boltzmann-averaged 26Mg/24Mg reduced partition function ratios were calculated in the order of aqueous Mg2+ > Mg-doped aragonite > Mg-doped calcite. The disorder structure model is likely applicable to the substitution of cations with radii smaller than the radius of Ca2+ ions in aragonite. Our study provides atomistic insight into metal substitution effects on the metal content and isotope fractionation in biogenic aragonite, which are critical for developing a reliable paleoenvironment proxy.