TEM investigation of a microcline from a nepheline syenite

Chess-board (“tiled”) microcline crystals from a nepheline-bearing syenite from Ilimaussaq, W. Greenland, were investigated using transmission electron microscopy (TEM) and were found to consist of a mosaic of slightly misoriented domains, which bear no obvious relationship to the optical microstructure. Part of the misorientation of most pairs of neighbouring domains involves a small rotation about c. However, some are related to adjacent domains by the albite twin law, the pericline law, or diagonal association. This microcline could have crystallized with triclinic symmetry which could account for the differences between the microstructure of this microcline and M-twinned microcline. Metasomatism may explain both the optical microscope and TEM scale structures of this microcline. Examination of the electron diffraction patterns of areas of microcline which contain both diagonally associated and twinned domains draw attention to the fact that each of the few orientations in an M-twinned crystal is related to one of the other orientations by diagonal association. The formation of common cross-hatch twinned microstructures are discussed with reference to diagonal association.