Mineralogical Society of America, American Mineralogist, 11-12(97), p. 1858-1865, 2012
DOI: 10.2138/am.2012.4020
Full text: Download
Borate minerals composed of [Bφ 3 ] triangles and/or [Bφ 4 ] tetrahedra (φ = O or OH) commonly exhibit complex polymerizations to form diverse polyanion groups. High-resolution solid-state magic angle spinning (MAS) 11 B and 25 Mg NMR spectroscopy at moderate to ultrahigh magnetic fields (9.4, 14.1, and 21.1 T) allows for very accurate NMR parameters to be obtained for the borate dimorphs, inderite, and kurnakovite, [MgB 3 O 3 (OH) 5 ·5H 2 O]. Improved agreement between experimental results and ab initio density functional theory (DFT) calculations using Full Potential Linear Augmented Plane Wave (FP LAPW) with WIEN2k validates the geometry optimization procedures for these miner-als and permits refinements of the hydrogen positions relative to previous X-ray diffraction crystal structures. In particular, the optimized structures lead to significant improvements in the positions of the H atoms, suggesting that H atoms have significant effects on the 11