New insights into the spatial confinement mechanism of nucleation of biogenic aragonite crystals from bivalve nacre

Abstract

The work presented here investigates the nucleation sites and corresponding controlling mechanisms of biogenic aragonite crystals from bivalve nacre. We find that they always nucleate on the margin of the underlying tablets, which are spatially confined. To explain the reason, we proposed several new possible factors leading to nucleation on the margin of the underlying tablets: the strain, crystallinity, hydrophobicity of the ILM substrate and the Ehrlich–Schwoebel (ES) barrier. These findings advance our current knowledge of nacre biomineralization and may help to design novel biogenic composite materials.