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In recent years, we have come to appreciate the astounding intricacy of theformation process of minerals from ions in aqueous solutions. In this context,a number of studies have revealed that nucleation in the calcium sulfate systemis non-classical, involving the aggregation and reorganization of nanosizedprenucleation particles. In a recent work we have shown that thisparticle-mediated nucleation pathway is actually imprinted in the resultantsingle micron-sized CaSO4 crystals. This property of CaSO4 minerals provides uswith an unique opportunity to search for evidence of non-classical nucleationpathways in geological environments. In particular, we focused on thequintessential single crystals of anhydrite extracted from the Naica mine inMexico. We elucidated the growth history from this mineral sample by mappinggrowth defects at different length scales. Based on these data we argue thatthe nano-scale misalignment of the structural sub-units observed in the initialcalcium sulfate crystal seed propagate through different length-scales both inmorphological, as well as strictly crystallographic aspects, eventually causingthe formation of large mesostructured single crystals of anhydrite. Hence, thenanoparticle mediated nucleation mechanism introduces a 'seed of imperfection',which leads to a macroscopic single crystal, in which its fragments do not fittogether at different length-scales in a self-similar manner. Consequently,anisotropic voids of various sizes are formed with very well-definedwalls/edges. But, at the same time the material retains its essential singlecrystal nature. These findings shed new light on the longstanding concept ofcrystal structure.

Seeds of imperfection rule the mesocrystalline disorder in natural anhydrite single crystals