Equation of state and high-pressure phase behaviour of SrCO₃

Abstract

The high-pressure phase transition of strontianite (SrCO3) was investigated at ambient temperature by means of powder and single-crystal X-ray diffraction. The samples were compressed in a diamond anvil cell to a maximum pressure of 49 GPa. Structure refinements confirm the existence of SrCO3 in the low pressure aragonite-type phase Pmcn (62) up to about 26 GPa. Above this pressure, SrCO3 transforms into a high-pressure phase with post-aragonite crystal structure Pmmn (59). Fitting the volume extracted from the compression data to the third-order Birch–Murnaghan equation of state for the low-pressure phase of SrCO3 yields K0=62.7(6) GPa and K0′=3.2(1), and for the high-pressure phase this yields K0=103(10) GPa and K0′=2.3(6). The unit cell parameters change non-uniformly, with the c axis being 4 times more compressible than the a and b axes. Our results unequivocally show the existence of a Pmmn structure in SrCO3 above 26 GPa and provide important structural parameters for this phase.