阴极发光与质谱联用对于地质晶体的研究

The new white paper, which demonstrates the possibilities of studying alluvial sapphires from Australia with cathodoluminescence (CL) imaging. This research shows how cathodoluminescence can help to assess crystallisation histories of the precious gemstones and underlying causes for luminescence. While being used for a wide range of geological application, including sedimentary petrology, igneous petrology, metamorphic petrology, crystal growth, and gemstone identification, cathodoluminescence is not a common technique to study natural sapphires. However, it is used on zircons frequently to see zircon growth crystallisation, and due to the color zonation in some sapphires, hyperspectral cathodoluminescence was used (together with laser ablation inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry) to examine zonation and trace element defects to understand the conditions of sapphire formation. The CL measurements for this research were performed with the SPARC, a cathodoluminescence detector, which was mounted on FEG scanning electron microscope (SEM) from Thermo Fisher Scientific/FEI. The results illustrate a strong correlation between color, trace element concentrations, and spectral CL measurements of sapphires.