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Ken
Joined: 14 Jul 2011
Posts: 40
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 Posted: May 04, 2020 00:16 Post subject: Altered/modified minerals |
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I've come across an area where several minerals have been in an environment that has caused many of them to become altered/modified. Here's a very odd looking piece of quartz, it looks as if that colored material was being squeezed out of the stone, it has a hardness of 7.5-8.0. The center of the stone is made up of crystals that have ridges or lines. Just curious, how much of a change does a mineral have to go through before it's classified as a new mineral?
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| Locality: | | California, USA |  |
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alfredo
Site Admin
Joined: 30 Jan 2008
Posts: 825
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| Posted: May 04, 2020 10:54 Post subject: Re: Altered/modified minerals |
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| To be classified as a new mineral species it needs to have a different chemical composition and/or a different crystal structure than any previously known mineral species; just having a different appearance is not enough. Based on your photos, the material you found is still quartz, a mineral that occurs on many different colors and shapes, so it would not qualify as a new mineral.
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Ken
Joined: 14 Jul 2011
Posts: 40
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| Posted: Jun 18, 2020 22:39 Post subject: Re: Altered/modified minerals |
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| alfredo wrote: | | To be classified as a new mineral species it needs to have a different chemical composition and/or a different crystal structure than any previously known mineral species; just having a different appearance is not enough. Based on your photos, the material you found is still quartz, a mineral that occurs on many different colors and shapes, so it would not qualify as a new mineral. |
I do agree, without any data, it's just a piece of quartz. Having any type of an analysis can be very helpful but with these minerals every time you do any type of an analysis, you end up with more questions than answers.
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