Growth of Self‐Assembling Tubular Structures of Magnesium Oxy/Hydroxide and Silicate Related With Seafloor Hydrothermal Systems Driven by Serpentinization

Sainz‐Díaz, C. Ignacio; Escamilla‐Roa, Elizabeth; Cartwright, Julyan H. E.

doi:10.1029/2018gc007594

Cited by 13 publications

(17 citation statements)

References 33 publications

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Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“… 17 , 19 , 22 Additionally, Sainz-Diaz et al . 11 revealed that the flower-like rosette crystals belong to magnesium oxy/hydroxide microspheres and small spheres indicated the mixture of magnesium silicates.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…4 The growth regime and visual morphology of the obtained chemobrionic structures from the direct injection experiment were similar to those of magnesium and calcium salts, especially for the injection techniques. 10,11 The presented controlled injection method offered a higher degree of control over the growth of chemobrionics than the direct injection method. Therefore, the growth pattern of the structures produced in the controlled injection method were photographed at different time intervals to observe the process and control possible fluctuations.…”

Section: ■ Results and Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Development of a Controlled Injection Method Using Support Templates for the Production of Chemobrionic Materials

2022

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Chemobrionics is a research field about the well-known self-organized inorganic structures. Numerous research works have focused on controlling their growth pattern and characteristic features. In the present study, a controlled injection method is proposed to produce more regular self-assembled chemobrionics compared to the standard direct injection technique. This method involves the injection of a metal salt solution into an agarose support template filled with an anionic solution. The obtained structures were studied by scanning electron microscopy, X-ray microtomography, X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy, Raman spectroscopy, Fourier-transform IR spectroscopy, and thermogravimetric analysis. Despite the complex mechanism and chemistry underlying the self-organization phenomena, the controlled injection method enabled the generation of regular standard chemobrionic structures with high experimental reproducibility. It provided the extraction of tubular structures from the reaction vessel without breakage, thus allowing comprehensive characterization. Furthermore, the morphological, chemical, and thermal features of these structures were highly correlated with the standard chemobrionics obtained in the direct injection method. The proposed controlled injection method holds great promise for understanding and controlling the properties of chemobrionics and related structures.

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Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: ■ Results and Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Development of a Controlled Injection Method Using Support Templates for the Production of Chemobrionic Materials

2022

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“…There is a great variety of subjects that can be studied through chemobrionics, e. g., corrosion, electrochemistry, sensors, and chemical motors [2,3] . One of the most interesting scientific questions in the ambit of chemobrionics is the origin of life, since life could have originated in oceanic hydrothermal vents, which are natural chemical gardens [2,4–8] …”

Section: Figurementioning

confidence: 99%

A Tungstate Chemical Garden

2020

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Tungstate chemical gardens have been prepared for the first time. The synthesis was carried out using cobalt(II) chloride and sodium tungstate. The reaction occurred in three steps: chimney formation, swelling, and upwelling of the chemical garden. This result opens the door to a new variety of materials. Chemical gardens are fascinating self-organizing inorganic structures consisting mainly of tubes and vesicles, which biomimic plant-like structures. From a first description by Johann Glauber in 1646, [1] chemical gardens have attracted attention. In the last few years, scientists have been interested in chemical gardens to explore a wide variety of scientific questions. This research field has been recently called chemobrionics. [2] There is a great variety of subjects that can be studied through chemobrionics, e. g., corrosion, electrochemistry, sensors, and chemical motors. [2,3] One of the most interesting scientific questions in the ambit of chemobrionics is the origin of life, since life could have originated in oceanic hydrothermal vents, which are natural chemical gardens. [2,4-8] Experiments to promote the formation of classical chemical gardens consist in adding to a solution of an anion a metal salt (all except the too-soluble alkali metals), in solid form of single crystals or as polycrystalline powder compressed into a pellet, or alternatively as a second liquid. A number of different solutions and metals have been shown to lead to the growth of chemical gardens. [2] In the solution, the commonest anion used is silicate, but many other anions have been also used: e. g., carbonate, phosphate, borate, arsenate and chromate. [2] Metals used to precipitate chemical gardens have been, e. g., Ca, Mg, Co, Ba, Fe, Cu and Zn, just to mention a few. [2,9] Interestingly, the growth of chemical gardens using crystals of anions and solutions of cations have also been reported. [2,10] These kinds of inverted systems have been described for polyoxometalates (POMs). [9] POMs are complexes with polyatomic ions, which can contain W, Mo, Mn, P, or Si in their structure.

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“…Although aluminum nitrate has not yet been detected, nitrates are being sought, being an important part of biogeochemical cycling on Earth (Wang et al., 2018), and nitrates have been detected in the soil at Gale Crater (Stern et al., 2015). Silica‐rich, alkaline fluids can be produced by serpentinization (oxidative hydration/hydrolysis of iron and magnesium silicates) (Sleep et al., 2004), and this could provide the other reactant for chemical garden growth (Sainz‐Díaz et al., 2018). Serpentinization is known to have occurred on Mars (Ehlmann et al., 2010), and other workers have suggested that alkaline, silica‐rich fluids are likely to have circulated in the subsurface (Michalski et al., 2013).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Chemical Gardens Under Mars Conditions: Imaging Chemical Garden Growth In Situ in an Environmental Scanning Electron Microscope

Sainz‐Díaz

Escribano

Sánchez-Almazo

et al. 2021

Geophysical Research Letters

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Although we now know that there are no canals on Mars, nonetheless the picture painted by that dramatic illusion of nineteenth-century astronomy and twentieth-century science fiction turns out to be broadly correct: Mars is a desert planet that has gradually lost its water (Kass & Yung, 1995). It is possible that life may no longer be extant on Mars but may have evolved there in earlier geological periods in which liquid water was common on the surface of the planet (Bibring et al., 2006), and it is also possible that there may still exist life on Mars in environments where liquid water persists (Davila & Schulze-Makuch, 2016). These hypotheses underlie the current search for signs of life, either extant or fossil, on Mars (Knoll & Grotzinger, 2006).In the recent past, and even today, morphology has been and is taken as a good indicator for life (Javaux, 2019). It goes without question that if one digs up a dinosaur fossil, that is a reliable indicator that such an organism once lived. But for smaller, particularly for single-celled organisms, morphology is an increasingly unreliable indicator of a biotic origin, because there exist abiotic processes that produce extremely lifelike forms (Livage, 2009). Chemical gardens, so called from their resemblance to biological structures, are one such system (McMahon, 2019) that has been known since the beginnings of chemistry (Glauber, 1646). They are today of interest both because they demonstrate how one might make progress with the nascent technology of non-equilibrium self-assembled materials (Barge et al., 2015), and also because geological chemical gardens found in alkaline hydrothermal vents on Earth may have been the places where life on Earth got started (

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Growth of Self‐Assembling Tubular Structures of Magnesium Oxy/Hydroxide and Silicate Related With Seafloor Hydrothermal Systems Driven by Serpentinization

Cited by 13 publications

References 33 publications

Development of a Controlled Injection Method Using Support Templates for the Production of Chemobrionic Materials

Development of a Controlled Injection Method Using Support Templates for the Production of Chemobrionic Materials

A Tungstate Chemical Garden

Chemical Gardens Under Mars Conditions: Imaging Chemical Garden Growth In Situ in an Environmental Scanning Electron Microscope

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