1.8" Sparkly, Pink Amethyst Geode Section - Argentina

This is a beautiful find out of Argentina, featuring true pink amethyst crystals and calcite crystals, collected from the Choique Mine. It occurs in geodic formations or cavities lined with crystals.

This geode section is 1.8" wide.

This material has been analyzed at the California Institute of Technology and was described as "purplish pink amethystine quartz additionally coloured by microscopic hematite particles". They are not rose quartz or pink quartz as classically defined.

Pink amethyst is formed by the same processes that gives amethyst its purple color, but by definition amethyst is purple, not pink. Thus, we are left with a conundrum of what to call it! But since the majority of people seem to be calling it "pink amethyst", we will stick with that label.

Quartz is the name given to silicon dioxide (SiO2) and is the second most abundant mineral in the Earth's crust. Quartz crystals generally grow in silica-rich environments--usually igneous rocks or hydrothermal environments like geothermal waters--at temperatures between 100°C and 450°C, and usually under very high pressure. In either case, crystals will precipitate as temperatures cool, just as ice gradually forms when water freezes. Quartz veins are formed when open fissures are filled with hot water during the closing stages of mountain formation: these veins can be hundreds of millions of years old.

Calcite, CaCO3, is a carbonate mineral and the most stable polymorph of calcium carbonate. The other polymorphs are the minerals aragonite and vaterite. Calcite crystals are trigonal-rhombohedral, though actual calcite rhombohedra are rare as natural crystals. However, they show a remarkable variety of habits including acute to obtuse rhombohedra, tabular forms, and prisms. Calcite exhibits several twinning types adding to the variety of observed forms. It may occur as fibrous, granular, lamellar, or compact. Cleavage is usually in three directions parallel to the rhombohedron form.
SOLD
DETAILS
SPECIES
Quartz var. Pink Amethyst & Calcite
LOCATION
Choique Mine, Pehuenches, Neuquen, Argentina
SIZE
1.8" wide
ITEM
#170147