Newsletter of the Global COE program

Deep Earth Mineralogy
Center for Advanced Experimental andTheoretical Deep Earth Mineralogy
先進的実験と理論による地球深部物質学拠点

No. 6, September 30, 2010

News & Events
Article of "New Scientist"
Dr. Masayuki Nishi, a JSPS
Postdoctoral Fellow recently joined
to the GRC, and his colleagues
published their research in a recent
issue of Geophysical Research
Letters (GRL). They determined theascending speed of diamonds fromthe mantle transition zone to the
Earth's surface based on experimentally observed transformation kinetics
of majoritic garnet found as inclusions in some natural diamonds. The speed was concluded to be unexpectedly fast compared with that of typical mantle convection. This
paper has been introduced in New Scientist, a famous popular sciencemagazine published in the UK (http://www.newscientist.com) anddistributed world-wide, immediately after it was published in GRL.
The article in this magazine is entitled "Diamonds travel at freeway
speeds inside Earth".

JAMS award to Prof. T. Inoue
Professor Toru Inoue of the GRC
received the JAMS award (the mostprestigious award of the Japan Association of Mineralogical Society) during theannual meeting of the JAMS held in
Matsue, Shimane Pref., on 23-25
September, for his outstanding researchachievements in high-pressure mineralogical studies of water-bearing systems.
Prof. Inoue is the only awardee among
about 1000 members of the JAMS thisyear who plays an important role as theleader of the education programs of our
Global COE. He received the certificate of the award and a supplementary prize of a tiepin made with a jadeite crystal, and gave anaward lecture after the ceremony. The JAMS is a scientific society inmineralogy and petrology in Japan, which was established in 2008 by
amalgamating two major Japanese societies in Earth sciences; The
Mineralogical Society of Japan and the Japanese Society of Mineralogy, Petrology, and Economic Geology.

Mass production of HIME-DIA
After the completion of the world-largest Kawai-type multianvil
apparatus (BOTCHAN-6000) in March 2009 at the SOSEKI Lab of
the GRC, efforts have been made to standardize the procedures forsynthesis of nano-polycrystalline diamond (NPD = HIME-DIA)
rods. As a result, a large number of HIME-DIA rods with dimensions of 7-8 mm have been successfully synthesized by Dr. Toru
Shinmei, the Lab manager, and Mr. Futoshi Isobe, a PhD student of
the GRC, under the supervision of Prof. Tetsuo Irifune. Some of theflawless NPD rods, now withmore than 50 pieces available,
are processed with a pulse
laser to form various shapes
for their use as anvils forsome high-pressure apparatus.
Moreover, technicaldevelopments in producing
even larger HIME-DIA rod
have been made by Mr. Isobe,
who has just succeeded in synthesizing rods with dimensions of 1 cm
in both diameter and length.

Visualization Award to Prof. M. Kameyama
Masanori Kameyama, anassociate professor of GRC,
received
theVisualization
Award (Flash of the Year) fromthe Visualization Society ofJapan (VSJ) on 20 July during its
annual meeting at Kogakuin
University for Visualization of
mantle dynamics. This award
was shared with Dr. Nobuaki
Ohno of Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology(JAMSTEC), and the related graphic animation based on this result
was demonstrated on the website of the society as the “Flash of themonth”. The VSJ started as the Society for Flow Visualization inabout 30 years ago, and now advances researches in visualization invarious research fields.

Setting-up a D-DIA at SPring-8
A D-DIA type guide block system,
which has been tested in the
MADONNA-1500 press at the GRC,
has been installed at BL04B1 ofSPring-8, replacing the existing
DIA-type guide block of SPEEDMkII, by the GRC and Sumitomo
Heavy Industries team lead by Drs.
Yu Nishihara and N. Nishiyama. The
guide block system is designed for
deformation experiments at very highpressure, as well as for high P-Tstudies using sintered diamond anvils, and such studies under the
lower mantle conditions are to be carried out by using this system
combined with a synchrotron X-ray source.

Page 1

News & Events
Meeting with the MEXT minister
Dr. Jun Tsuchiya, a Senior Fellow at the Senior Research Fellow
Center of Ehime University and who works closely with GRC members, had an opportunity to talk with the headquarters of the Ministryof Education, Culture, Sports, and Technology (MEXT) of Japan,
including the minister, Mr. Tatsuo Kawabata, in the forum held in
Takamatsu city of Kagawa prefecture on 29 August. Seven young
researchers from the major universities in the western part of Japan
gathered at the meeting, and Dr. Tsuchiya gave a talk on the current
status of female researchers and related issues, representing young
scientists from Ehime University. The results of the hearings by theministry members should be reflected in the future planning of thescience and technology policy of the Japanese government.

3rd YESA Workshop at GRC

The third workshop of the Young Earth Scientist Association(YESA) of the Global COE program was held in Matsuyama in 2-3
September, entitled "Properties of hydrogen and water in the Earthand planetary interiors". About 30 young scientists in experimental
and theoretical mineral physics, including those from outside the
GRC, such as Univ. Tokyo, Tohoku Univ., Osaka Univ., Okayama
Univ., and Japan Atomic Energy Agency, etc. attended the workshop
and had comprehensive discussion on the properties and roles ofhydrogen-bearing systems in the Earth and planetary interiors,
followed by a BBQ party in front of the SOSEKI Lab of the GRC.
YESA (current leader; Dr. Shin-ichi Machida of global COE Postdoctoral Fellow) is organized by the young scientists at the GRC formutual communications and interactions within the COE and with theyoung scientists of other institutions in Japan.

2nd COE Summer School

The second COE Summer School was held in a small village near
the border between Ehime and Kochi prefectures during 2-4 August,focusing on the modeling of the structure and dynamics of the
Earth’s lower mantle and the core. About 10 participants withvarious backgrounds in theoretical and experimental studies, mostly
from the GRC, gathered and had extensive discussions, while avoiding the hot summer in the city regions. Dr. Satoru Tanaka of IFREE,
JAMSTEC, was invited as the special guest speaker, who gave a

Page 2

keynote talk on the structure and dynamic processes of the innercore.

Display at the Museum of Ehime University
The new University Museum
was opened last November, where
the GRC has a booth in the Deep
Earth Section. This booth wasrecently renewed, and a brilliant
cut HIME-DIA about 8 mm indiameter and the guide block
system of the former ORANGE1000 are being displayed to the
public, as well as the activities of
GRC and the Global COE program. The museum is divided into fourzones: (1) Evolving Space and Earth, (2) History of Ehime University
and Ehime province, (3) Variations of Life, and (4) Human Activities.
The research outcomes and activities from the major research
centers, including the GRC, Center for Marine and Environmental
Sciences (CMES; another global COE hub in Ehime University), and
the
CSTRC
(Cell-free
Science and Technology
Research Center; internationally famous for its very original protein synthesis technology) are also exhibited. The
museum also has a Café andattracts
manystudents,
citizens, tourists, etc., and thenumber of visitors alreadyexceeded 50,000 in the 9months after opening.

Activities during 2010 JpGU meeting
At the Japan Geoscience Union (JpGU) Meeting 2010 in Makuhari during the period of 23-28 May, two sessions were organized by
the members of the present Global COE program. The first was aninternational session entitled "Mineral physics and dynamics of deep
mantle", which was convened by Dr. M. Kameyama, Assoc. Prof. of
GRC, together with Dr. Takashi Yoshino at ISEI of Okayama Univ.
and Dr. Dapeng Zhao of Tohoku Univ. In this session, twenty-nine(22 for oral and 7 for poster) papers from various disciplines onmineral physics and geodynamics of the planetary interiors were
presented by researchers from many countries. Intensive discussions
were made by more than one hundred attendees, focusing on (1)thermal/chemical structure, (2) behaviors of fluids and/or hydrous
minerals, and (3) rheology of the deep mantle.
The second session was entitled "Interpretations of seismic observations in subduction zones", convened by Drs. Yoshio Kono andYusuke Usui, the members of the Young Earth Scientist Association(YESA) of the GRC. The session aimed at an interdisciplinary
discussion on the interpretations of seismological observations fromthe viewpoint of several research fields, such as geological, experimental, and simulation studies, with particular emphasis on theunderstanding of the nature and dynamics of subduction zones. In
this session, eighteen (3 for invited and 15 for contributed) papers
were presented by students and researchers from various
universities/institutes in Japan.
During the meeting, an exhibition booth was run by GRC members to advertise the activities of the GRC and global COE. At thebooth, hot research products by the GRC were also displayed, including the nano-polycrystalline diamond (HIME-DIA) and facilities
installed at the GRC. The materials displayed in the booth successfully attracted many participants/visitors, in spite of the absence of"Botchan" or "Madonna", the main characters of a Japanese novel
written by Soseki Natsume, as were performed in the previous year.

News & Events
Overseas internship at RSES, ANU

International Frontier Seminar

Dr. Yoshio Kono, a COE Research Fellow, left GRC in late
September for Australia for collaboration with Prof. Ian Jackson at
the Research School of Earth Sciences, Australian National
University. Dr. Kono is planning to work on elastic and inelastic
properties of partially molten rocks at high pressure, as one of theLong-term Overseas Internships of the Global COE program andwill stay in Canberra for about three months. The GRC holds amutual agreement on the exchange of researchers/students andcollaborations with RSES, and Prof. Jackson is appointed as theguest professor of the GRC during the period of the COE program.

19th (31st May)
"Melting of peridotite to 140 GPa"
Lecturer : Prof. Guillaume Fiquet
Institute de Minéralogie et de Physique des Milieux Condensés,
UMR CNRS 7590, Université Pierre et Marie Curie Paris 6)

Career Advancement Lecture Series
1st (5th March)"How to write scientific papers for high IF journals"
Lecturer: Prof. Tetsuo Irifune (Geodynamics Research Center,
Ehime University)
2nd (16th April)"Common Mistakes in English for a Non-Native Speaker(Don't Worry, We Make Them, Too)"
Lecturer: Ms. Sabrina ARA Whitaker (Geodynamics ResearchCenter, Ehime University)

Invited talks at international symposia
Prof. Taku Tsuchiya gave an invited talk on the thermal structuresand chemical compositions in the mantle-core boundary region
based on ab initio calculations during the 12th SEDI symposium(SEDI2010) held at UC Santa Barbara during 18-23 July. He also
gave a seminar at Prof. Bruce Buffett's Lab at UC Berkeley after this
symposium. Meanwhile, Prof. Tsuchiya and one of his colleagues
gave invited talks at the Western Pacific Geophysics Meeting(WPGM) held in Taipei on 22-25 June. These facts indicate that
Prof. Tsuchiya's group at the GRC is now truely one of the leading
teams in theoretical mineral physics in the world.

COLUMN: Chinese Festival at Ehime University

An out-door party was held at the Museum of Ehime University
organized by Chinese and Japanese students/residents in Matsuyama to celebrate the founding of the new country of China on
3rd October and also to enhance mutual communications andfriendship among the people in the two countries. The GRC now
has 5 Chinese PhD students and 2 postdoctoral fellows, who contributed to the performance of Chinese traditional dance and preparing Chinese foods for the participants, including some staff
members of the GRC. We happen to have a Japanese traditional
festival for harvest in the Matsuyama region in early Octoberwhere a number of portable shrines or "Mikoshi" of individual
towns are carried on people's shoulders and march in every street.
Matsuyama is known for the violent bumping ceremony of such
Mikoshis', occasionally causing some serious injuries and evendeaths of the participants. Meanwhile, Japan and China have somecommon traditional festivals. The Moon Festival in September is
one of them, and people in both countries share the same idea ofappreciating the beautiful full moon in Autumn while eating tradi-

3rd (12th May)
"Researches in companies and required abilities"
Lecturer: Dr. Hitoshi Sumiya (Advanced Materials R&D Laboratories, Sumitomo Electric Industries, Ltd.)
4th (26th July)"Making proteins"
Lecturer: Prof. Yaeta Endo (Cell-Free Science and Technology
Research Center, Ehime University)

tional sweets of rounded shapes that model the moon with family
members. We do hope to maintain and develop our mutual understanding and collaboration between the two countries with similarand common traditions.

Page 3Forthcoming Events
Workshop "Hydrogen Quantum Atomics"

2nd TANDEM symposium at CUG in Wuhan

Date: 27- 28 October, 2010, Venue: Ehime University
The 8th Workshop of the Hydrogen Quantum Atomics will be heldin Matsuyama on the 27th and 28th of October, partially supportedby the Global COE program. This workshop is organized by Dr. Jun
Tsuchiya of the Senior Research Fellow Center, and various aspectsof the behavior of hydrogen will be discussed by the researchers withexperimental and theoretical backgrounds. This workshop is annually held by the members of a Japanese research group with various
backgrounds who are working on the phenomena relevant to hydrogen (Representative persons: Prof. Shinji Tsuneyuki, Univ. Tokyo;
Prof. Yu Fukai, Chuo Univ., and Prof. Susumu Ikeda, KEK). For
further details:(http://white.phys.s.u-tokyo.ac.jp/hydrogen/index.htm).
Contact address:

Geodynamics Research Center, Ehime University
2-5 Bunkyo-cho, Matsuayama 790-8577, JAPANJun Tsuchiya (Senior Research Fellow)
Email: junt@sci.ehime-u.ac.jp

The second TANDEM symposium will be held at China University of Geoscience in Wuhan during the period of 5-7 November,partly supported by the Global COE program. About 40
researchers/students are expected to attend the symposium fromJapan, including 30 people from the GRC, where they will discuss
the current status of the TANDEM activities and on-going researches
in individual research groups. Profs. T. Irifune (GRC), Y. Wang
(GSECARS, Chicago Univ.), Y. Fei (GL, Carnegie Inst.) will give
keynote talks, and about 70 oral/poster presentations will be given by
the participants from China, Japan, Taiwan, Korea, USA, andGermany. The best presentation will be selected from those by theyoung scientists and awarded during the symposium. The first
TANDEM meeting was held in Matsuyama in 2008 to enhancemutual understandings and communications among the leading
institutes in Deep Earth mineralogy and related fields in the Asian
region. For further details:(http://deep-earth-mineralogy.jp/tandem/index.html).

New Members
Zhou Chunyin (PhD Student)
I joined the GRC after I
received my Master's degree from
China University of Geosciences(CUG) in Wuhan, China. In my
Master's research, I worked on thephase relations in a compositionof (Mg0.93Fe0.07)SiO3 by using a
2000-ton press of the GRC. We
found that the stabilities of minerals are affected greatly by thecomponent of iron. By calculating
the seismic velocities, wesuggested some new explanation
for the cause of the high velocity
anomaly in the deep subduction
zone in the mantle transition region. Now my research interests focus
on the phase transformations in those minerals and rocks in the
mantle. I would like to learn more about the ultra-high pressuretechniques by training programs here. My continuing work is to study
the phase relations in the minerals of the mantle using the multi-anvilpress. I hope to carry out in-situ X-ray diffraction experiments withsynchrotron radiation in the future and that would advance my knowledge of mineral physics and geodynamics in the mantle.

Yang Cuiping (PhD Student)
I have been here several times, so I am nota new character to the GRC exactly.
However, my doctor course is just beginning
this October.
I received my master's degree at the end of
this June from China University ofGeosciences (CUG) (Wuhan), under the
direction of Prof. Inoue in GRC and Prof. Jin
in CUG. The topic of my thesis is "Equationof state of antigorite under high pressure andhigh temperature determined by in-situ X-ray
diffraction", and the experiments were done in PF, Tsukuba, Japan,
when I was here as an internship student between Sep. 14th, 2009 toFeb. 1st, 2010. Before that, I did some work on the water content
and micro fabric of mantle xenoliths, such as peridotite, using

Page 4

Electron backscatter diffraction (EBSD) and FTIR.
As for my PhD course at the GRC, my research interest focuseson the hydrous phase in the deep mantle, under the direction ofInoue-sensei, and I want to learn how to use the high pressure
apparatus at the GRC.

Qin Jiaqian (JSPS Postdoctoral Fellow)
My name is Jiaqian
Qin and I started working
at the GRC in July 2010as a JSPS postdoctoral
fellow. I received myPh.D from Sichuan
University in June 2010.
My doctoral dissertation
research focused on thephase stability ofmaterials under highpressure and hightemperature, and highpressure synthesis ofnovel materials. During
my Ph.D, I investigatedthe phase stability of MAX phases under high pressure and hightemperature, and first reported the phase segregation of Ti2AlC at
high pressure and high temperature. In addition, I also synthesized
the nearly full-densified phase-pure ReB 2 , WB, WB 2 , and WB 4
compacts under high pressure and high temperature, and firstmeasured the asymptotic-hardness region and elastic properties ofbulk samples, and suggested that the ReB2 is only a hard material
but not a superhard one. Then I calculated the elastic modulus,
Debye temperature and hardness of WB, WB 2 , ReB 2 , and WB 4
using first-principle calculations. My current research interest is highpressure synthesis of novel materials. During my stay at the GRC, I
would like to design and synthesize some novel Boron-richtransition metal borides and Si-C-N compounds under high pressureand high temperature. This project will be performed by using themultianvil press and supercomputers at the GRC and synchrotron
radiation at SPring-8.

Hot Researches by Young Scientists
Discovery of True Path of Wurtzite
under High Pressure
Li Lei( COE Postdoctoral Fellow)

The transformation of the hexagonal
wurtzite-type structure (B4) to the cubic
rocksalt-type structure (B1) is a significant
transition pathway in A NB8-N binary semiconductors. Because of the need to understand the microscopic mechanism for thisstructural transformation and the wide rangeof technological applications of A NB8-N
binary semiconductors, the general B4-B1
pathway, which itself cannot be observed
directly, has stimulated many studies for thelast few decades. So far, at least four possible
paths have been proposed, among which two
pathways involving different intermediatephases have been attracting much more
attention. One of these pathways is thetransition path through an "h-MgO-type"intermediate phase, in which the ratio of the

Theoretical investigation of thethermodynamic properties of(Mg,Fe2+)SiO3 post-perovskite
Arnaud Metsue(COE Postdoctoral Fellow)(Mg,Fe)SiO3 post-perovskite is thought tobe the most abundant phase in the D" layer.
Mineral physical studies on this phase areimportant in investigating the structure anddynamics of the Earth's deep mantle.
However, experimental investigations of thethermodynamic properties of the postperovskite phase remain difficult, due to its
high pressure and high temperature ranges ofstability.
In this work, we have investigated thethermodynamic
propertiesof(Mg0.9375Fe 0.0625)SiO3 post-perovskite theoretically. We conducted density functional
theory (DFT) calculations within the LDA+U

c axis to the a axis in the primitive cell firstdecreases from c/a = 1.63 (wurtzite) to c/a =1.2 (h-MgO), and then increases to c/a = √2(rocksalt). The other is the path via a"tetragonal-type" intermediate phase, inwhich the value of c/a first increases to c/a =1.74 (tetragonal), and then decreases to c/a =√2 (rocksalt).
In our recent work, the stoichiometric
mixed-metal oxide LiGaO2, has been used as
the ternary wurtzite-type model to elucidate
the mechanistic details of the B4-B1
pressure-induced transitions in pure anddeficient wurtzite-type semiconductors.
Different from the binary wurtzites, as
shown in Fig. 1, there exist two different
cation relaxations in LiGaO2, the layerrocksalt-type (R-3m) and the newlydiscovered
disordered-rocksalt-type(Fm-3m) phases, which are different productsof the B4-B1 transition from ternarywurtzite-type (Pna21), and another newlydiscovered metastable tetragonal I4/m structure LiGaO2 with c/a = 1.46 (slightly larger
than √2) is found to be the intermediatephase between the ternary wurtzite-type(Pna21) and the rocksalt-type phases (R-3m
and Fm-3m). The B4- to B1-type path inbinary wurtzite is generally not observed,
but in the case of ternary wurtzite LiGaO2,
the direct experimental observation of thetetragonal-type primitive cell structure with
c/a = 1.46 after static compression of thewurtzite-type structure is undoubtedly
strong evidence for the "tetragonal-type"transformation pathway scheme, in which

the "tetragonal-type" structure should be anintermediate step on the way from the B4- to
B1-type structure in wurtzite-type semiconductors.

framework since the conventional DFT do
not accurately reproduce the interactions
between the 3d orbitals of iron. We introduce
ferrous iron, which can be present in the highor low spin state, as a substitution defect in apure MgSiO3 post-perovskite supercell.
The thermodynamic properties arederived from the Helmholtz free energy inthe quasi-harmonic approximation. The
vibrational contribution to the Helmholtz
free energy is obtained from the phonon
frequencies spectra. Here, we developed a
new technique combining a direct determination of the phonon dispersion curves andan internally consistent LDA+U method,where the Hubbard U parameter was
optimized for each volume and spin state.
We have determined the pressure-volume
equations of state, the isothermal bulk modulus BT, the thermal expansion coefficient α,
the heat capacities Cv and Cp and the vibrational contribution to the entropy Svib up to
150 GPa and 4000 K. The data are comparedto those reported for pure MgSiO3 postperovskite. The results in Fig. 1 show that a
low concentration of iron, irrespective of thespin state, has minor effects on the equationsof state of the post-perovskite phase,
especially at the pressure-temperature conditions of the D" layer. α and BT increaseslightly with the incorporation of iron while
Svib, Cv and Cp are not clearly affected.
This work is the first attempt to take into

account complex chemical compositions in
the theoretical determination of the thermodynamic properties of minerals. The effects
of ferric iron or other impurities, such asaluminum, are directions for further studies
for a complete understanding of the physicalproperties of the post-perovskite phase.

Fig. 1. The P-T phase relations of LiGaO2.
The symbols indicate the conditions for thefollowing key observations: black circles forthe pure orthorhombic β-LiGaO2, red circles
for the pure hexagonal α-LiGaO2, green
circles for the pure γ-LiGaO2, and blue
circles for the pure cubic δ-LiGaO2. Two or
more colors on one circle stand for themixed phases. The colorized area in thecircle indicates the estimated content of thesingle phase in the high-pressure recovered
sample by means of comparison of the strongest powder X-ray diffraction lines. Line 1
is the boundary between the stable regionsof orthorhombic β-LiGaO2 and hexagonal
α-LiGaO2, and line 2 is the boundary
between the stable regions of hexagonal
α-LiGaO2 and cubic δ-LiGaO2. The inset isthe typical SEM image of newly discovered
cubic δ-LiGaO2.

Fig. 1. Pressure-volume relations for highspin/low spin (Mg0.9375Fe0.0625)SiO3 and pure
MgSiO3 [Tsuchiya et al., 2005, J. Geophys.
Res.] post-perovskite at 300, 1000, 2000,
3000 and 4000 K up to 150 GPa. The dashedlines represent the pressure-temperature
range where the validity of the QHA isquestionable.

Page 5TANDEM

THE ASIAN NETWORKIN DEEP EARTH MINERALOGY
News & Events

2nd TANDEM symposium at CUG (Wuhan), China
Date: 5-7, Novemver, 2010
Venue: China University of Geosciences (Wuhan), China
Tentative schedule:
5th (Friday)
08:30-17:30
Oral sessions
6th (Saturday)
08:30-12:00
Oral sessions
14:00-17:00
Poster sessions & Laboratory tour
(16:00-17:00 Meeting of TANDEM representatives)
18:00Banquet
7th (Sunday)
09:00-17:00
Excursion
The detailed schedule and abstracts will be informed via themailing list of TANDEM members and in the web site below:(http://deep-earth-mineralogy.jp/tandem/index.html)

A special volume for Prof. Zenmin Jin
The contributions to a special volume of Journal of Earth Scienceswere called on the occasion of the upcoming birthday anniversary of
one of the outstanding scientists in field of mantle rheology androcks deformation, Prof. Zhenmin Jin of China University ofGeosciences in Wuhan, to celebrate his scientific life achievements.
The volume consists of series of papers that highlight versatility ofProf. Jin's scientific interests emphasizing his life-long fascination
with rheology and rock deformation, and edited by Profs. L.
Dobrzhinetskaya, J. Zhang, H.W. Green, and T. Irifune. The papers
are written by his colleagues, collaborators, former and current
students, as well as some of the contributors to the 2nd TANDEM
meeting to be held in Wuhan in 5-7 November. Prof. Jin plays
important roles in the enhancement of scientific collaborations andexchange of researchers/students among the high-pressure mineral
physics and rock chemistry laboratories in Asian regions, as therepresentative of the Chinese community of the TANDEM.

PhD students to Special course of GRC from CUG
Two students, Mr. Chunyin Zhou and Ms. Cuiping Yang, from
China University of Geosciences (CUG), Wuhan, have started on
their PhD studies in Special PhD course in deep Earth mineralogy at
the GRC (See Page 4 for their self-introductions). The special courseof the GRC was established last year to foster PhD students from
Asian countries for world-leading scientists/technicians in scientificfields relevant to deep Earth mineralogy. They follow two students
enrolled in the course last autumn from Sichuan University, China.
At present, 7 young scientists from China, 5 PhD students and 2 PD
Fellow, join the GRC, which indicates steadily conduct of
TANDEM agenda aiming for the exchange of young scientists in
Asian countries.

Page 6

Last year, the GRC offered the opportunity of several months'
internship at the GRC for Mr. Zhou and Ms. Yang (master course
students from the CUG at that time). They experienced practicalexperiments with the advanced facilities in the GRC and SPring-8
for studies of the deep
Earth mineralogy. Theinternship opportunity isprovided for master course
students, who are stronglyinterested in enrollment in
the special PhD course, as
preparatory experiences ofresearch activities at the
GRC and living in Japan.

Call for Special PhD course and internships at GRC
Special PhD course in deep Earth mineralogy at the GRC, Ehime
University, is open for students from Asian countries with financial
supports from the University. The course offers educational
programs for advanced experimental, theoretical and computational
studies on Earth's deep structure and related sciences andtechnologies. The exam and enrollment for FY2011 will be May and
September, 2011, respectively. In addition, the GRC offer theinternship experience before the special course examination forsome selected strong candidates. GRC will support the travel fee andliving cost during their visit.
The detailed information on the Special PhD course and theinternship opportunities at the GRC will be indicated at theforthcoming TANDEM symposium at Wuhan by a poster presented
by Dr. Akira Yamada. On the application of the Special PhD course
for FY2010, see
http://deep-earth-mineralogy.jp/g-coe2008/english/positions/Contact:
Prof. Toru Inoue (inoue@sci.ehime-u.ac.jp)
Dr. Akira Yamada (yamada@sci.ehime-u.ac.jp)

TANDEM Laboratories
Department of Earth Sciences,
National Cheng Kung University

Cheng Ku ng Universit y was reorganized in 1965 f rom a
pre-existed body established as Tainan Technical College in 1931,
located in Tainan. The Depar t ment of Ear th Sciences wasestablished in 1968 and now has 14 full-time faculty members.
Research fields include geochemistry, marine chemistry andphysics, mineralogy, petrology, paleontology, oceanography,hydrogeology, geophysics and structural geology, lately added space
physics and nano-technology. Major analytical facilities of thedepartment include laser-ablation ICP-MS, TIMS, XRD, SEM and
TEM.
Dr. Jennifer Kung of the Depar tment of Ear th Sciences isrepresentative person of TANDEM at Cheng Kung University andis interested in the chemical and physical properties of earthmaterials and related materials. High pressure research program
has been seeded in this department in early 1990's. The highpressure experiments have been carried out using diamond anvil
cells to study phase transition, equation of state and latticedynamics of Earth materials or related materials in conjunction with
X-ray diffraction or/and Raman spectroscopy. Kung continues
leading the diamond anvil cell program in the department after
taking the faculty position in 2005. The studied materials included
the perovskite-structured and NaCl-structured materials andpyroxenes.
In the October of 2009, a large-volume multi-anvil press was
installed in the Department of Earth Sciences for studying Earthmaterials at high pressure conditions. The apparatus is equippedwith a 1000-ton hydraulic press and a double-sided rail system toaccommodate two sets of multianvil modules which can beinterchanged on a run-to-run basis. The current installed device is a
250-ton DIA-type module. With built-in hydraulic actuators, called
differential rams, it is possible to control displacements of the upperand lower anvils independently. In this case, the press can provide
either a quasi-hydrostatic pressure environment or a differential
stress field on the sample to be studied. A Walker module isplanned to be installed in the future to extend the experimentalpressure range to the top of the lower mantle (25 GPa, 2500 K).
This large-volume press is the first multi-purpose high pressure
ap p a r at u s i n st a l le d i n Ta iwa n , i.e. s y nt he si s a nd i n - sit u
measurements. The research interests within the groups ofgeochemistry, mineralogy and petrology can be extended to theexperimental conditions up to high pressure and temperature
regime. Interfaced with the other experimental modules, we expect

to perform the in-situ measurements on the materials interested.
Moreover, when differential load is applied u nder desi red
experimental conditions, the D-DIA enables us to conduct rheology
studies for upper mantle minerals. The cell assembly testing andpressure calibration for the press are under way collaborating with
Drs. Kurt Lienenweber of Arizona State University and Yanbin
Wang of University of Chicago, primarily.
Contrast to the materials in the Earth's interior, the presence of
micropores within the crustal rock has significant influence on its
elastic anisotropy and transport properties. Studying the physicalproperties of crustal rock is another developing research program
within the group. A 400 MPa pressure vessel was installed and has
incorporated instrumentation to measure the elastic wave velocities(P and S wave) under controlled pore fluid pressure. To understandthe elastic anisotropic behavior in rocks, the study of pore fabric iscarried out in parallel. Our current investigated material is thepermeable reservoir sandstones.
The group members at NCKU in 2010 include two senior Ph. D
students who study lattice dynamics of materials at high pressureand high temperat u re, t wo f irst-year MS st udents who areinteresting in experimental petrology and rock physics, few
undergraduate students who are working along graduate students
with various research subjects, and a project research assistant.
NC K U t e a m i s a f a i rly yo u n g g r o u p c o m p a r e d w it h t h ewell-established laboratories within TANDEM network and is at thestage of in-house instrumentation setting up and development. We
expect the major development and setting up of the laboratorycompleting sometime in 2011. In parallel, the utilizing synchrotron
facility to study the physical and chemical properties of materials athigh pressure and temperature is another research direction for
NCKU team. At the same time, NCKU team is looking forward tocollaborating with TANDEM network teams.
Correspondences:
Jennifer Kung (jkung@mail.ncku.edu.tw)

1000 ton press frame with 250 ton D-DIA module and pressure
and temperature controlling system.

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TANDEM Laboratories
The Insutitute for Solid State Physics (ISSP),The University of Tokyo

At the farewell party of students in the group in March, withsome guests
High-pressure groups in ISSP, the University of Tokyo, were
founded in 1961 by Professors S. Akimoto and S. Minomura. Since
then, they have been playing an important role as one of the leading
high-pressure laboratories in Japan. Current high pressure andtemperature group led by T. Yagi has started in 1986 and it is the
only laborator y in ISSP where the g raduate st udents f rom
geophysics major are learning. It is one of the laboratories in the
New Materials Science Division of ISSP and various studies, notonly in the field of Earth and planetary science but also in the fieldof materials science, are carried out. The number of in-housescientific member now is only three staffs, one post doc and two
graduate students, but ISSP has various programs to invite outsidescientists. As a result many outside scientists, not only from inside
Japan but also from various countries, are staying with us andcarrying out the collaboration researches.
Our laboratory is one of a very few laboratories in the world
where both large-volume presses and diamond anvils are working.
We have made many efforts since 1970's to extend the pressure andtemperature ranges of in situ X-ray diffraction study using both
multi-anvil apparat us and diamond-anvil apparat us. Using
DIA-type cubic-anvil apparatus combined with laboratory X-ray
source, experimental techniques up to 100 kbar and 1400 K wasdeveloped at late 1970's which was further developed as MAX-80

apparatus by combining with a synchrotron radiation at the Photon
Factory in Tsukuba in 1980's. Using diamond anvil, we have started
the high-pressure in situ X-ray diffraction above 1 Mbar from1980's. Development of the techniques to use sintered diamond as
anvil material was also performed intensively in 1980's and we havesucceeded, for the first time, to make in situ X-ray observations ofsilicate perovskite under the lower mantle conditions. Further
extension of the pressure range above mega bar at elevatedtemperature was achieved by developing a new laser-heateddiamond anvil system at the Photon Factory in 1990's. This system
was copied at SPring-8, further developed and finally resulted in
the finding of "the post-perovskite phase", in 2004 by Murakami etal.
Using these experimental techniques, various studies to clarify
the structure and property of materials relevant to the Earth's deep
interior, such as silicate spinels, silicate perovskites, a new
high-pressure form of silica, and post-perovskites, together withiron, have been carried out. Other than these subjects in Earthscience, many studies from a view point of materials science, suchas graphite-diamond transition and super-hard materials, have been
also car ried out. Synthesis of new materials under extreme
condition is also an import field in our group. The list of the works
is available at our web site (http://yagi.issp.u-tokyo.ac.jp/).
Current major facilities are three large-volume presses which
cover from 3 GPa to 30 GPa for material synthesis. Diamond anvil
laboratory has three different types of laser (YAG, fiber, and CO2),
and we can heat a variety of samples to several thousand degrees
under pressure up to about 2 Mbar. High-pressure in situ X-ray
system using rotating anode Mo radiation and Raman spectroscopy
system for high-pressure in situ measurements are also working. We
are also working hard to constr uct a new beam line for highpressure and temperature neutron measurements at J-PARC, Tokai.
The detail of this high-pressure neutron project is available in thefollowing web site:
http://yagi.issp.u-tokyo.ac.jp/shingakujutsu/en/index.html.
Correspondences:
Takehiko Yagi (yagi@issp.u-tokyo.ac.jp)

Large-volume press laboratory with 700 ton Kawai-type apparatus(left) and 500 ton DIA-type apparatus (right)

Laser-heating diamond-anvil laboratory

Global COE Newsletter, issued Jan., May and Sep.
Geodynamics Research Center, Ehime University
2-5 Bunkyo-cho, Matsuyama 790-8577, Japan
Tel & Fax : +81-89-927-8405
E-mail : g-coe@sci.ehime-u.ac.jp
URL: http://deep-earth-mineralogy.jp/
Edited by Akira Yamada and Tomo Ohkuma
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