Gemstones and Minerals
The Mother Earth has given us splendid variety of organic and inorganic gemstones and minerals.
What are Gemstones?
There are hundreds of natural minerals which comes in form of lovely crystals . Mostly of them are valued as "gemstones". Gemstones in form of rough form do not give us stunning look as they give dazzling look after cutting. The more cutting will be beautiful and with expert hands, the more they will come out as beautiful. The more they will have luster and brilliance, they more it will be valued and priced high.
Gemstones are divided into precious and semi precious categories. In precious gemstones, there are rubies, sapphires, emerald, diamonds , and some rare gemstones also. Semi precious includes comparatively larger variety of gemstones such as amethyst, quartz, peridots, morganite, tourmaline, sphene, aquamarine and much more. However precious gemstones are of great value and price continuously in the market and in the eyes of people.
Precious gemstones have demand in the market always. Diamonds which are made of carbon atoms is the hardest natural mineral on the Earth. Diamonds are formed under great pressure hundred miles below the Earth. There are only a few locations where diamonds are found in the world. Another form of carbon is graphite. It has however different arrangements. Diamond is the hardest stone whereas graphite is the softer one. Than, there comes corundum variety. Corundum variety include rubies and sapphires mostly. Ruby comes in red colour, Sapphire has large variety of colours. Red colour comes by trace element of chromium. Sapphire trace elements are generally iron, titanium and chromium.
3rd one is Emerald which is a variety of Beryl. In Berly variety, there are aquamarine, morganite, hellidor and goshenite also. But Emeralds are considered royal gemstones. Emerald comes in green colour. Emerald colour comes by traces like chromium and vanadium. Whereas in Aquamarine and morganite, there are different trace elements which form the different colours.
Gemstones are identified or valued by physical properties, luster, colour, clarity, density or hardness. There are many ways to identify the gemstones by marks like streak, or breaking.
Minerals
There are approximately more than 4000 minerals in inorganic solid form with different chemical composition and crystal structure. Minerals are formed simply by individual elements or molecules which are usually arranged in repeating chains, three dimensional arrays or sheets. When molten rock or lava / magma cools down, minerals are formed. In another way by separating out of mineral-rich water in the underground caverns. The particles of minerals are small which are formed either in lava flows or grains of sediments. There are also large crystals like which are formed in Geodes or any other rock which are rare. Even rocks are mixture of different types of minerals. These mixing of rocks and minerals also form the land development and form other natural resources such as iron, copper, granite, marble and much more.