Nomenclature of pyroxenes

• Published in: Mineralogical Journal Vol. 14; no. 5; pp. 198 - 221
• Main Author: MORIMOTO, Nobuo
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Japan Association of Mineralogical Sciences 1989
• ISSN: 0544-2540; 1881-4174
• DOI: 10.2465/minerj.14.198

This is the final report on the nomenclature of pyroxenes by the Subcommittee on Pyroxenes established by the Commission on New Minerals and Mineral Names of the International Association. The recommendations of the Subcommittee as put forward in this report have been formally accepted by the Commision. Accepted and widely used names have been chemically defined, by combining new and conventional methods, to agree as far as possible with the consensus of present use. Twenty names are formally accepted, among which thirteen are used to represent the end-members of definite chemical compositions. In common binary solid-solution series, species names are given to the two end-members by the “50% rule”. Adjectival modifiers for pyroxene mineral names are defined to indicate unusual amounts of chemical constituents. This report includes a list of 105 previously used pyroxene names that have been formally discarded by the Commision.