Compression of olivine to 100 kilobars

Abstract

The compressions of the cell parameters of a natural olivine were studied to pressures greater than 100 kb using a high-pressure, in situ, X-ray powder-diffraction method. The a (smallest) and the b (largest) cell parameters of orthorhombic olivine are found to have nearly the same compression values (xp/xo) to 100 kb and are more compressible than the c cell parameter. The subsequent volume calculations indicate that olivine is less compressible than has been reported from static work and from equation-of-state calculations based on ultrasonic elastic constant results.