The World’s Rarest Mineral Is So Uncommon It is Solely Ever Been Discovered As soon as : ScienceAlert

There is a mineral so uncommon that just one specimen of it has ever been present in all the world.

It is known as kyawthuite (cha-too-ite), a tiny, tawny-hued grain weighing only a third of a gram (1.61 carats). On first look, you would possibly mistaken it for amber or topaz; however the unassuming mineral speck has worth past measure.

The stone itself was bought in 2010 at a market in Chaung-gyi in Myanmar by gemologist Kyaw Thu, who thought the uncooked gem was a mineral known as scheelite. After he faceted the stone, although, he realized that he was one thing uncommon.

Unable to match the mineral with something identified, he despatched it to the Gemological Institute of America (GIA) Laboratory in Bangkok, Thailand. There, mineralogists had been capable of relate the stone to artificial BiSbO₄ – bismuth antimonate – although with the components Bi³⁺Sb⁵⁺O₄, an association by no means earlier than present in nature.

“This is the first in the world. It is not found in other countries,” Thu advised The Myanmar Occasions in 2016.

“From studying in the field and buying stones from the Khanae market, [I could tell that] this stone was a little strange and I bought it. Then, when I reached Yangon, I examined it [and determined that] this was not like any other gem we’ve ever found.”

We do not know a lot in regards to the stone itself. It has a saturated orange shade, with a crimson overtone and a white streak; that is the colour of the powder the gem produces when it’s dragged throughout a rough floor. It additionally has hole, tube-shaped inclusions known as en echelon veins which can be attributable to shear stress – proof of its pure formation.

Geologists assume that was possible igneous in origin, an inclusion in a kind of widespread volcanic rock known as pegmatite, widespread within the area the place the stone was discovered. Like granite, pegmatite’s composition is much like that of a fruit cake, with completely different minerals jumbled in; it’s normal to search out giant crystals of gems in pegmatite.

Traces of titanium, niobium, tungsten, and uranium within the kyawthuite are in step with a pegmatite formation. Moreover, experiments within the lab present that bismuth antimonite crystals type at excessive temperatures in step with the temperatures of cooling magma. Because the mineral seems to be so uncommon, there are possible different particular circumstances about the way it varieties, however we do not know what they’re.

The worth of kyawthuite is at present listed as priceless. The world’s second-rarest gem, a mineral known as painite, is valued at US$50,000 to $60,000 a carat. Oof.

The world’s solely identified piece of kyawthuite is at present housed safely on the Nationwide Historical past Museum of Los Angeles County.