Sign In


Products
   Fossils
   Replicas
   Clothing
   Jewelry
   Fluorescent Minerals & Equipment
     Arizona
     Australia
     Canada
     New Jersey
     Wyoming
     South Dakota
     Nebraska
     English Fluorescents
     Utah
     Fluorescent Eq.
     Mexico
       White Calcite
       Yellow Calcite
       Fluorite
       Smithsonite
       Calcite
       Hemimorphite
       Calcite & Fluorite
       Selenite
       Aragonite
       Adamite
       Adamite & hemimorphite
     Other Fluorescents
     Brazil
     China
     Florida
     India
     Ohio
     Peru
     California
     Bulgaria
Brazil calcite and quartz
Perchoerus - peccary
Illinois
Dinosaur Eggshell
Crocodile teeth
Trematochamsid crocodile
Ginglymostoma moroccanum
Media
Brachiopods
Fossil Egg Shell
Echinoids
Echinoderms
Coral
Nautiloids
Elrathia kingii - fossil trilobite
Phacops
Bivalves - France

This specimen is smithsonite from the El Refugio Mine in Choix, Sinaloa, Mexico. Generally, smithsonite does not fluoresce, but some of the specimens from this location do. It fluoresces only under short wave. The colors it fluoresces are pink, blue and green. The green areas will phosphoresce for a short while after the lights are turned off in a completely dark room. The phosphorescence is due to the fact that smithsonite is a zinc carbonate. Willemite from New Jersey, USA has similar properties.

Under normal light smithsonite will be clear to white, tan, brown, or grey (depending upon the form it has taken, some of which may or may not fluoresce). To see a photo under normal lighting conditions return to the main fluorescent page and click the page link "to view specimen material from Mexico."

Smithsonite gets its name from James Smithson, who was the illegitimate son of Hugh Smithson (a British nobel and the first Duke of Northumberland). He was born James Lewis Macie, in France in 1765 and later adopted his father's name and became a naturalized British citizen.

Smithson was very interested in chemistry and mineralogy and devoted much of his time to the qualitative analysis of minerals. One of his many papers regarding mineralogy was "A Chemical Analysis of Some Calamines." He showed that calamine actually consists of two minerals, zinc oxide and zinc carbonate. It is the zinc carbonate which was later named "smithsonite" in his honor.

Smithson died on June 27, 1829 in Italy and was buried in Genoa. He amassed a sizable fortune during his lifetime which eventually was given "to the United States of America, to found at Washington, under the name of Smithsonian Institution, an Establishment for the increase and diffusion of knowledge...".

Smithsonite
 
Smithsonite Quantity in Basket: None
Code: MS-103
Price: $41.25
Shipping Weight: 0.47 pounds
 
 
Quantity:
 
Location: El Refugio mine, Choix, Sinaloa, Mexico
Size: 2-5/8" x 2-3/8" x 1-1/2"



Ecommerce Shopping Cart Software by Miva


Ecommerce Shopping Cart Software by Miva