GAO Feng^1,2， LI He-ping¹， XU Li-ping¹， LI Juan^1,2， ZHANG Wei^1,2

(1. Laboratory for High Temperature & High Pressure Study of the Earth's Interior, Institute of Geochemistry, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Guiyang 550002, China;
2. University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100049, China)

Abstract: Pyrite is the most widely distributed and abundant sulfide in the crust. The occurrence of pyrite is typically characterized by cubes, octahedrons or pyritohedrons with respect to crystal typomorphology. Studies have shown that certain typomorphologies resulting from the formation of pyrite crystals can provide a wealth of geological information with respect to temperature, pressure, pH, Eh, oxygen fugacity, sulfur fugacity and other data. There are two basic research methods for this interpretation: analysis of field samples and experimental simulations at high temperature and pressure. The former is more frequently used for the study of pyrite in goldmines, and infrared microscopy is used to analyse the internal structure of pyrite and their use has achieved breakthrough results, but difficulties for penetration of infrared light through pyrite in under high-temperature conditions remain to be solved. Experimental study of pressure and temperature remains the only method to observe the growth habit of pyrite. However, due to the limitations in different conditions of research methods currently available, typomorphic pyrite morphology is not uniform. Hence, standard type pyrite morphology studies still need other breakthroughs to be improved both theoretically and practically.

Key words: pyrite; typomorphic feature; research method