Document Type

Article

Publication Date

9-17-2020

Publication Title

Nature Communications

Volume

11

First page number:

1

Last page number:

7

Abstract

High pressure can drastically alter chemical bonding and produce exotic compounds that defy conventional wisdom. Especially significant are compounds pertaining to oxygen cycles inside Earth, which hold key to understanding major geological events that impact the environment essential to life on Earth. Here we report the discovery of pressure-stabilized divalent ozonide CaO3 crystal that exhibits intriguing bonding and oxidation states with profound geological implications. Our computational study identifies a crystalline phase of CaO3 by reaction of CaO and O2 at high pressure and high temperature conditions; ensuing experiments synthesize this rare compound under compression in a diamond anvil cell with laser heating. High-pressure x-ray diffraction data show that CaO3 crystal forms at 35 GPa and persists down to 20 GPa on decompression. Analysis of charge states reveals a formal oxidation state of −2 for ozone anions in CaO3. These findings unravel the ozonide chemistry at high pressure and offer insights for elucidating prominent seismic anomalies and oxygen cycles in Earth’s interior. We further predict multiple reactions producing CaO3 by geologically abundant mineral precursors at various depths in Earth’s mantle.

Disciplines

Biological and Chemical Physics | Physical Sciences and Mathematics | Physics

File Format

pdf

File Size

1.191 KB

Language

English

Creative Commons License

Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

UNLV article access

Search your library

Share

COinS