Carbon on Quartz Grain Boundaries: Continuous Films versus Isolated Plates

Piston-cylinder experiments on quartzites containing a small amount of carbon were conducted at 1.0-1.4 GPa and 850-1500° C in order to assess the microstructure of graphite along grain boundaries in deep crustal materials. In one series of experiments, polished 3mm diameter single-crystal quartz discs were coated with ∼50 to 150 nm of evaporated carbon or 500 to 1000 nm of alcohol-based carbon paint. Stacks of these were subjected to high P-T conditions for durations ranging from 5 minutes to 10 days. Observations from our earlier experiments suggested that the coatings become discontinuous with time at high temperature. However, more recent observations show that coated disc boundaries contain a dark, interconnected material: those subjected to lower temperatures and shorter durations exhibited continuous films; those run at higher temperatures for longer durations contained thicker, yet still interconnected dendrite and plate structures. In contrast, relatively fine-grained synthetic quartzites produced at similar conditions typically do not contain continuous films. Quartz powder with an initial grain size between 75-150 μ m, coated with 30-50 nm of evaporated carbon, was subjected to 850-1300° C for durations ranging from 1 hour to 6 days. Only very short runs at low temperatures contained irregular boundaries still darkened by a connected film; longer duration and higher temperature quartzites exhibited texturally-equilibrated quartz grains accompanied by isolated small opaque carbon plates located along grain corners, edges, and grain boundaries. Identical features are seen in additional quartzite materials constructed in graphite cylinders using uncoated powdered silica glass or smaller quartz crystals (<22 μ m) taken to 1000° C and 1.4 GPa for 14 days. The results suggest that carbon may remain as a connected surface, at least metastably, on silicate mineral boundaries in the absence of grain boundary movement. With grain growth, carbon diffuses along boundaries, accumulating in plates along boundaries, edges, and corners, presumably to reduce the surface energy of the system. The behavior of carbon in a given grain boundary may depend on the lattice misorientation of that boundary.