Magnetic mineralogy


Magnetic mineralogy is the study of the magnetic properties of minerals. The contribution of a mineral to the total magnetism of a rock depends strongly on the type of magnetic order or disorder. Magnetically disordered minerals contribute a weak magnetism and have no remanence. The more important minerals for rock magnetism are the minerals that can be magnetically ordered, at least at some temperatures. These are the ferromagnets, ferrimagnets and certain kinds of antiferromagnets. These minerals have a much stronger response to the field and can have a remanence.

Weakly magnetic minerals

Non-iron-bearing minerals

Most minerals with no iron content are diamagnetic. Some such minerals may have a significant positive magnetic susceptibility, for example serpentine, but this is because the minerals have inclusions containing strongly magnetic minerals such as magnetite. The susceptibility of such minerals is negative and small.
MineralVolume susceptibility at room temperature
graphite-80 to -200
calcite-7.5 to -39
anhydrite-14 to -60
gypsum-13 to -29
ice-9
orthoclase-13 to -17
magnesite-15
forsterite-12
halite-10 to -16
galena-33
quartz-13 to -17
celestine-16 to -18
sphalerite-31 to -750

Iron-bearing paramagnetic minerals

Most iron-bearing carbonates and silicates are paramagnetic at all temperatures. Some sulfides are paramagnetic, but some are strongly magnetic. In addition, many of the strongly magnetic minerals discussed below are paramagnetic above a critical temperature. In Table 2 are given susceptibilities for some iron-bearing minerals. The susceptibilities are positive and an order of magnitude or more larger than diamagnetic susceptibilities.
MineralVolume susceptibility
garnet2,700
illite410
montmorillonite330-350
biotite1,500-2,900
siderite1,300-11,000
chromite3,000-120,000
orthopyroxene1,500-1,800
fayalite5,500
olivine1,600
jacobsite25,000
franklinite450,000

Strongly magnetic minerals

Iron-titanium oxides

Many of the most important magnetic minerals on Earth are oxides of iron and titanium. Their compositions are conveniently represented on a ternary plot with axes corresponding to the proportions of 4+, 2+, and 3+. Important regions on the diagram include the titanomagnetites, which form a line of compositions for between 0 and 1. At the end is magnetite, while the composition is ulvöspinel. The titanomagnetites have an inverse spinel crystal structure and at high temperatures are a solid solution series. Crystals formed from titanomagnetites by cation-deficient oxidation are called titanomaghemites, an important example of which is maghemite. Another series, the titanohematites, have hematite and ilmenite as their end members, and so are also called hemoilmenites. The crystal structure of hematite is trigonal-hexagonal. It has the same composition as maghemite; to distinguish between them, their chemical formulae are generally given as γ for hematite and α for maghemite.

Iron sulfides

The other important class of strongly magnetic minerals is the iron sulfides, particularly greigite and pyrrhotite.

Iron alloys

Extraterrestrial environments being low in oxygen, minerals tend to have very little 3+. The primary magnetic phase on the Moon is ferrite, the body-centered cubic phase of iron. As the proportion of iron decreases, the crystal structure changes from bcc to face centered cubic. Nickel iron mixtures tend to exsolve into a mixture of iron-rich kamacite and iron-poor taenite.