Lecture: Adventures in crystallisation: How to produce synthetic minerals. Not as easy as it looks!

Lecture by Dr. Juan Diego Rodriguez-Blanco, 2021 EAG Distinguished Lecturer

Although there are more than 4000 known minerals in nature, the synthesis of crystals with functional properties is essential to ensure the feasibility of modern technological applications. In this talk I will give an overview of the most commonly used crystallisation techniques, highlighting the main difficulties and challenges that need to be overcome to obtain crystals with specific compositions, structures and physicochemical properties.

Dr. Juan Diego Rodriguez-Blanco is based in the Department of Geology (School of Natural Sciences), Trinity College Dublin, Ireland. His fields of research are environmental mineralogy and crystallisation. His research focuses on mineral genesis and the interaction of aqueous species with mineral surfaces. In particular, he studies the mechanisms of mineral nucleation and growth and the interaction of common seawater ions, pollutants and organics with mineral surfaces and their relevance to global-scale processes like biomineralisation, biogeochemical element cycling and the evolution of the global chemistry of the oceans.