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Like all phyllosilicates, clay minerals are characterised by two-dimensional sheets of corner-sharing SiO 4 tetrahedra or AlO 4 octahedra. The sheet units have the chemical composition (Al, Si) 3 O 4. Each silica tetrahedron shares three of its vertex oxygen ions with other tetrahedra, forming a hexagonal array in two dimensions.
Kaolinite (/ ˈ k eɪ. ə l ə ˌ n aɪ t,-l ɪ-/ KAY-ə-lə-nyte, -lih-; also called kaolin) [5] [6] [7] is a clay mineral, with the chemical composition Al 2 Si 2 O 5 4.It is a layered silicate mineral, with one tetrahedral sheet of silica (SiO 4) linked through oxygen atoms to one octahedral sheet of alumina (AlO 6).
Clay has a high content of clay minerals that give it its plasticity. Clay minerals are hydrous aluminium phyllosilicate minerals, composed of aluminium and silicon ions bonded into tiny, thin plates by interconnecting oxygen and hydroxide ions. These plates are tough but flexible, and in moist clay, they adhere to each other.
In mineralogy, silica (silicon dioxide, SiO 2) is usually considered a silicate mineral rather than an oxide mineral. Silica is found in nature as the mineral quartz , and its polymorphs . On Earth, a wide variety of silicate minerals occur in an even wider range of combinations as a result of the processes that have been forming and re-working ...
Montmorillonite, a member of the smectite group, is a 2:1 clay, meaning that it has two tetrahedral sheets of silica sandwiching a central octahedral sheet of alumina. The particles are plate-shaped with an average diameter around 1 μm and a thickness of 0.96 nm ; magnification of about 25,000 times, using an electron microscope, is required ...
Because of silica hydrolysis, most of silica was dissolved in seawater and removed from the ashes giving rise to the formation of smectites. Smectites found in many marine clay deposits are often formed in this way as it is the case for the Ypresian Clays found in Belgium and very rich in smectites.
It has one silica and one alumina plane per crystal; hence it is a 1:1 type clay. One plane of silica of montmorillonite is dissolved and is replaced with hydroxyls, which produces strong hydrogen bonds to the oxygen in the next crystal of clay. [46]
Silicon dioxide, also known as silica, is an oxide of silicon with the chemical formula SiO 2, commonly found in nature as quartz. [5] [6] In many parts of the world, silica is the major constituent of sand. Silica is one of the most complex and abundant families of materials, existing as a compound of several minerals and as a