Sixty sphalerite samples were collected from various mines in Japan. Ore deposits of Oe (Hokkaido), Toyoha (Hokkaido), Namariyama (Akita Prefecture), Nikkatsu (Akita Pref.) and Kuroiwa mines (Fukushima Pref.) are vein type deposits, those of Hanawa (Akita Pref.), Yoshino (Yamagata Pref) Yonaihata (Fukushima Pref.) and Kidogasawa (Tochigi Pref.) mines are so-called Kuroko type deposits, while Hitachi mine is a Kieslager type deposit.
From the results of chemical analyses and X-ray measurements on sixty sphalerite samples, it has been recognized that natural β ZnS minerals consist of the β
1 sphalerite and β
2 sphalerite.
The unit cell edges in β
1 sphalerites are determined by Fe, Mn and Cd content dissolved in this minerals, and the equations of relation between unit cell edges and FeS content in this minerals are shown a
0=5.4103+0.000717 X and a
0=5.4124+0.000349X. a
0 is in Angstrom unit and X is mole % FeS, and both these equations are continuous.
The solubility of Mn in β
1 sphalerite increase with an increasing FeS content, so that it is a function of the temperature and pressure as well as the variation of FeS content. The correlation between Fe and Cd is random, but the variation of Cd solubility is constant.
From the variations of Fe, Mn and Cd content, β
1 ZnS system is divided into β
1 (Zn, Fe, Cd)S and β
1 (Sn, Fe, Mn)S system.
Also the equation of β
2 sphalerite is shown by a
0=5.4093+0.000290X.
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