Sakurai’s Object revisited: new laboratory data for carbonates and melilites suggest the carrier of 6.9-μm excess absorption is a carbonate

We present new room-temperature 1100 - 1800 cm^{-1} spectra of melilite silicates and 600 - 2000 cm^{-1} spectra of three randomly orientated fine-grained carbonates to determine the possible carrier(s) of a 6.9~micron absorption feature observed in a variety of dense astronomical environments including young stellar objects and molecular clouds. We focus on the low-mass post-AGB star Sakurai's Object which has been forming substantial quantities of carbonaceous dust since an eruptive event in the 1990s. Large melilite grains cannot be responsible for the 6.9-micron absorption feature because the similarly-shaped feature in the laboratory spectrum was produced by very low (0.1 per cent by mass) carbonate contamination which was not detected at other wavelengths. Due to the high band-strength of the 6.9-micron feature in carbonates, we conclude that carbonates carry the astronomical 6.9~micron feature. Replacement of melilite with carbonates in models of Sakurai's object improves fits to the 6 - 7-micron Spitzer spectra without significantly altering other conclusions of Bowey's previous models except that there is no link between the feature and the abundance of melilite in meteorites. With magnesite (MgCO3), the abundance of 25-micron-sized SiC grains is increased by 10 - 50 per cent and better constrained. The mass of carbonate dust is similar to the mass of PAH dust. Existing experiments suggest carbonates are stable below 700~K, however it is difficult to ascertain the applicability of these experiments to astronomical environments and more studies are required.