Small flat fancy cut tanzanian beryl with hematite inclusion, just 1.11 ct.
Except of dendrite-like hematite inclusions and some other I found one funny tine crystal. I presumed it is apatite, but maybe I am wrong, as more and more I look at this crystal... If to cut off the top, it looks almost the perfect cube. So I have doubt on my identification, another suggestion is fluorite...
Crystal is very well shaped, transparent, has some other stuff precipitated on facets, probably hematite again. Also crystal has its own inclusion, with is under max magnification available with my microscope (320x, can not be photographed) looks like other crystal inside of "large" one.. Of course - no idea what is that secondary inclusion in the inclusion as object is very very small. "Large" crystal has length about 0.095 mm, small one is about 20 times smaller, but still somehow visible near the top of the crystal (on the left on picture). Orange area behind this inclusion is hematite. On the right hand of this crystal is visible not well focused browns inclusion, I presume some kind of mica.
This photography was one of the fist I made working with my new (at that time) microscope, just learning the process of photomicrography as a process, and first with such a high magnification factor (200x) I did not deleted after all... Picture has been stacked just form 13 original shots, I made mach more, but almost all has been deleted as very very difficult to move focus while working on such a small object with such a high magnification..
Original has been taken under diffused transmitted light and side 45 degrees fiber-optic illumination. Field of View is 1.15 mm
_________________ All stones are alike, all stones are precious; but man sees only a few of them... Maurice Maeterlinck
Last edited by GSK on Tue Aug 18, 2015 3:00 pm, edited 1 time in total.
A few inclusions in sapphire I can not make my mind what is that. Looks like sapphire has been heat treated, but even this can not say for sure. Inclusions showing tension halos, but crystal structure of inclusions looks safe, not melted. Also structures are different, one looks like cubic, other like rhomboid...
So any suggestions are welcomed.
Blue sapphire 1.7 ct, Pailin (Cambodia) origin.
Dark field illumination, 80x, FoV 3.0mm
Transmitted polarized light, 200x, FoV 1.15 mm
Transmitted polarized light, 200x, FoV 1.15 mm
Transmitted polarized light, 200x, FoV 1.15 mm
Reflected + FO polarized light, 200x, FoV 1.15 mm
_________________ All stones are alike, all stones are precious; but man sees only a few of them... Maurice Maeterlinck
Orange and rose sapphires from (probably) Sri Lanka.
Orange looks like heated but I don't see jet evidence of diffusion. Stone is very bright and intensive colored, and has inclusion I can not identify. It his hexagonal di-pyramidal form with flat-cut tops. The grounds of the pyramids both fall on a cross-layer fluid inclusions of "fingerprint". natural facets of crystal do not look like touched by high temperature, so I dues it is something with quite high melting point, or I made a mistake thinking about high-temperature heating of this sapphire.
Dark field illumination, 100x, FoV 2.30 mm
Pink sapphire shows some internal details made me to feel completely lost. I can not even make my mind if this stone is heated or not. Picture shows very small area with a few different types of inclusions. "Fingerprints", partially looks like not heated, partially like heated. Crystals with bubbles inside, but can not call them negative, so maybe that bubbles are also liquids? Growth tubes with liquid objects, and very glassy looking inclusion with typical glassy surface..
Dark field illumination, polarized light, 200x, Fov 1.10 mm
I hope to hear suggestions...
_________________ All stones are alike, all stones are precious; but man sees only a few of them... Maurice Maeterlinck
Friend of mine hunting gemstones in Asia always remembers about my "love with inclusions" and often sending me stones which can not be sold out except some one chose for his inclusions collection or as sample for learning purpose.. So mostly these stones stay in my own "inclusion collection"...
One of such samples - Cambodian sapphire. After reading and re-reading of Atlas of Inclusions, I came to first suggestion that black crystals in this sapphire - graphite. Opaqueness, very low luster and no halos.. But graphite should be hexagonal dipyramidal, but this one on second picture clearly visible as octahedral, so I changed my suggestion to magnetite.
Dark field illumination, diffused light, 40x, FoV 6.05 mm
Dark field illumination, diffused light, 100x, FoV 2.35 mm
_________________ All stones are alike, all stones are precious; but man sees only a few of them... Maurice Maeterlinck
Something new never seen, unexpected in unexpected... I got a bag of garnets, and in this bag were some garnets, but also I found 3 zircons there... One zircon shows me something I don't understand what is it...
1. Stone itself, 8.95 carat reddish orange, or other way to say cranberry-brown. Very clean, some visible imperfections under microscope appeared to be a dirt! I tried to remove some, and it has gone...
Inclusions were almost not visible under slight magnification, only I mentioned there is something there when got up 80x.
Photographing of these became very challenging. This zircon in not affected by metamictization and very strongly birefringent, so it took a while to catch correct position of polarizer. Also stone is dark enough, and with FO-lighting inclusions were almost not visible, so had to use only standard microscope source of transmitted light and very low speed of shots, 10 sec. Also cats really wanted to help me and hardly tried to help... smile emoticon
Transmitted polarized light, 120x, FoV 2.00 mm
Transmitted polarized light, 200x, FoV 1.15 mm
Both pictures has been corrected a bit for brightness and contrast.
What are these inclusions I don't know. Not-metamict metamorphic zircon can have needle like inclusions: rutile, sillimanite, actinolite. Which of those can be intersected under 90 degrees angle? As I know - not rutile... Due its very small sizes and very complex optical nature of zircon I can not see the form of those needles even under 320x... Also it can not be a "boomerang" due their origination only in green metamict zircons from Sri Lanka...
So question is opened and not answered...
_________________ All stones are alike, all stones are precious; but man sees only a few of them... Maurice Maeterlinck
Post subject: Re: Usual and unusual gemstones and inclusions
Posted: Thu Nov 19, 2015 1:24 am
Gemology Online Veteran
Joined: Sat May 22, 2010 2:51 am Posts: 755 Location: South Africa
GSK wrote:
What are these inclusions I don't know. Not-metamict metamorphic zircon can have needle like inclusions: rutile, sillimanite, actinolite. Which of those can be intersected under 90 degrees angle? As I know - not rutile...
Zircon is tetragonal, so why should rutile needles not intersect at 90 degrees in zircon? Surely the host's crystallography determines the orientation of exsolved inclusions.
Duncan Miller, that's what is "hidebound thinking" using usual standards (I'm talking about myself ...) and luck of good deep knowledge in mineralogy (again about myself) + end of very long day after over 50 stones photographing when was not able to think about simple things...
Thank you.
Still question - if 2 needles of rutile intersected at 90 degrees - ok, understand, possible because of crystal structure of zircon. But if one rutile needle has been grown from other, they are not just intersected, but connected, this is also possible? Need to find information and read about that, I was thinking that rutile needles always connected at 120 dgr... Here I see some setes of 2 needles, connected (not intersected) at 90 and at 120...
_________________ All stones are alike, all stones are precious; but man sees only a few of them... Maurice Maeterlinck
Post subject: Re: Usual and unusual gemstones and inclusions
Posted: Sat Nov 28, 2015 12:58 pm
Platinum Member
Joined: Tue Jun 03, 2008 4:40 pm Posts: 2667 Location: South Dakota
In keeping with the title... I find this quartz crystal utterly fascinating. It's been polished to remove some imperfections......even so...damn papagoite/ajoite, hematite, kaolinite! from South Africa
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_________________ MrAmethystguy ~ Some jokes just fluorite over my head!
Post subject: Re: Usual and unusual gemstones and inclusions
Posted: Mon Nov 30, 2015 12:18 am
Site Admin
Joined: Sun Oct 16, 2005 12:22 pm Posts: 21602 Location: San Francisco
Jason Barrett wrote:
In keeping with the title... I find this quartz crystal utterly fascinating. It's been polished to remove some imperfections......even so...damn papagoite/ajoite, hematite, kaolinite! from South Africa
Wow....do you have anything empirical to add for us geeks?
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