Detrital zircon grains of an igneous rock as seen through an incident light microscope. Photo credit: Martin Lindner. From: Költringer Geology November 21, 2023 Case Study: detrital zircon [ED: On the occasion of releasing a new dataset: ON-004-04D Data tables of detrital zircon U-Pb geochronologic analyses and trace element concentrations of select Cretaceous, Paleogene, and Neogene rocks, Denver Basin and Northeastern Colorado (Data) – v20231110 that features data on 10 samples tested from a…
Diamonds in the rough, note the regular octahedral forms and trigons (of positive and negative relief) formed by natural chemical etching. Photo credit: Wikimedia. Minerals February 19, 2018 What are diamonds? Diamonds are formed from pure carbon, one of the most abundant elements on planet Earth. Diamonds, even from ancient times, have been sought for their extraordinary hardness (they are the hardest substance known) and their brilliance, especially in the colorless transparent gemstone variety. Ironically the other form of pure carbon…