Materials
Shale
Sedimentary Rock
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A fine-grained clastic sedimentary rock formed from mud, a mix of clay mineral flakes and silt-sized fragments of quartz and calcite, and the most common sedimentary rock on Earth. Its signature property is fissility, the tendency to split into layers less than a centimeter thick, and under low-grade regional metamorphism it becomes slate.
Facts
Formation ClassSedimentary, clastic (formed from mud of clay minerals and silt-sized particles) 1 Cross-Tradition Connections
Associated With
Slate is the low-grade metamorphic product of a shale-type sedimentary rock.
In Discipline
Sources
1. Shale (Wikipedia)
Wikimedia FoundationLead sectionQuote, Lead section
Shale is characterized by its tendency to split into thin layers (laminae) less than one centimeter in thickness. This property is called fissility. Shale is the most common sedimentary rock.
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