Diopside Mineral

Hello dear community, at the beginning I would like to welcome you all to my new post and hope you have a great start to the weekend! In this article I would like to bring you closer to a mineral and hope you can expand your knowledge.

Here you can see an enchanting specimen of diopside, which is a frequently occurring mineral and belongs to the silicate minerals and was previously known as coccolite. The first discoveries were probably made at the beginning of the 19th century by the Brazilian mineralogist José Bonifácio de Andrada e Silva (1763 - 1838) who, in addition to his passion for minerals, is also known as the former Foreign Minister of Brazil and the first discoveries of diopside come from Sweden. A few years later it came to the conclusion that the French mineralogist René-Just Haüy (1743 - 1822) had found a mineral with the same chemical composition that he published under the name diopside and it came to the fact that the old name has been replaced and he decided to name it after the Greek words dis for double and opsis for appearance and referred to the fact that the crystals often tend to form twins. The typical color is green and depending on the additions with other minerals, it can happen that it takes on different shades of green and because of the different colors, it is also often the talk about different variations which are defined by their admixtures. Diopside is usually produced as a component of basic rocks and and it can also be created under the influence of magmatic conditions and interesting is also the property that it can also occur under the influence of heat through metamorphosis and a good example is the conversion of tremolite into diopside by the influence of heat. Nowadays, several thousands of places of discovery are documented worldwide and it often occurs together with other minerals such as quartz, tremolite, calcite or others and in this specimen epidote can also be seen and it is interesting to mention that it has also been found in samples of the moon or Mars. From an economic point of view, it is particularly interesting for the production of jewelry and for these purposes mainly more beautiful specimens are used and is also interesting in the circles of collectors.

Thanks a lot for stopping by and I hope you could learn something new about minerals! I captured these pictures with my Camera Sony Alpha 6000 plus 55-210 mm lens.