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Mineralogical Magazine; April 2008; v. 72; no. 2; p. 617-626; DOI: 10.1180/minmag.2008.072.2.617
© 2008 Mineralogical Society of Great Britain and Ireland
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Crystallization of biogenic Ca-carbonate within organo-mineral micro-domains. Structure of the calcite prisms of the Pelecypod Pinctada margaritifera (Mollusca) at the submicron to nanometre ranges

A. Baronnet1, J. P. Cuif2,*, Y. Dauphin2, B. Farre2 and J. Nouet2

1 Université Paul Cézanne and CRMCN-CNRS, UPR 7251, Campus Luminy, Case 913, 13288- Marseilles cedex 9, France
2 UMR 8148 IDES, Bat. 504, Université Paris XI, 91405 Orsay cedex, France

* E-mail: jean-pierre.cuif{at}u-psud.fr

Atomic force microscopy (AFM) and transmission electron microscopy (TEM) were used to investigate the fine structure of the calcite prisms from the pearl-oyster shell Pinctada margaritifera. The AFM analysis shows that the prisms are made of densely packed circular micro-domains (in the 0.1 µm range) surrounded by a dense cortex. The TEM images and diffraction patterns allow the internal structure of the micro-domains to be described. Each of them is enriched in Ca-carbonate. Hosted in distinct regions of each prism, some are fully amorphous, and some others fully crystallized as subunits of a large calcite single crystal. At the border separating the two regions, micro-domains display a crystallized core and an amorphous rim. Such a border probably marks out an arrested crystallization front having propagated through a previously bio-controlled architecture of the piling of amorphous micro-domains. Compared to recent data concerning the stepping mode of growth of the calcite prisms and the resulting layered organization at the µm-scale, these results give unexpected views regarding the modalities of biocrystallization.

KEYWORDS: biomineralization, atomic force microscopy, transmission electron microscopy, amorphous calcium carbonate






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