Cuspidine : Ca8(Si2O7)2F4
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Cuspidine : Ca8(Si2O7)2F4
Field of View: 6.8 mm
Data Identifiers
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May 22 2023: Cuspidine has now been added to the MSH species list.
Update May 20 2023: The bright blue glow is likely from cuspidine, the ID of which has finally been established via SEM-EDS, Raman, and “pseudo-Gandolfi” XRD thanks to Joy Desor. Of these analyses, the most convincing (to me) are the SEM-EDS and XRD. I have posted all of these results as “analysis” under [https://www.mindat.org/photo-1297996.html], which see for more details. Note: While I am fairly confident about the “cuspidine” ID, I have not yet added it to the MSH species list pending comments from some MSH experts.
Preliminary update Dec 2022: Per recent SEM-EDS by Joy Desor, this is likely cuspidine with pectolite. Subsequent to this analysis, I located well-formed (but still embedded) xls that look very similar to cuspidine from Italy, e.g. [https://www.mindat.org/photo-269577.html], [https://www.mindat.org/photo-849701.html], etc. The EDS scans are very similar to that shown in [https://www.mindat.org/photo-1142552.html] (from Inner Mongolia), but unfortunately the F was not quantified, so I am awaiting quantification (as well as XRD confirmation) before adding cuspidine to the MSH species list.
Original post June 2022:
This is new parent photo. I posted it because I think the four pictures say pretty much all of what I was trying to say in a thousand words before. But you can still read that under the old parent image which is now a child photo.
Viewing clockwise, the first image (top left) shows very brightly fluorescing crystals under MW UV. They are almost as bright under SW. The second image shows that there isn’t very much that correlates clearly with the fluorescing stuff. On the bottom, the first image is a 50-50 overlay of the two images at the top. It makes it clearer what’s glowing and what’s not. The last image is an attempt to do the same in a different way. For that photo I used both the MW LED “flashlight” and one of my scope lights turned 90+ degrees from the specimen. I probably could have had the light shining more directly at the specimen, but I was afraid that wouldn’t work out in a time exposure. In retrospect, I’m sure that it would have. The fluorescence is really, really bright!
But the bottom line is the same as before. I now have a better idea of what is fluorescing – but only in these photos. I still don’t see anything distinctive enough to say: “That’s going to fluoresce”. So getting a “pure” sample for analysis is likely to be a real pain.
Regarding the mixed MW + visible light image: Note that the presence of visible light affected how my camera’s white balance algorithm rendered the fluorescent color of the UK. I have noticed this over and over in other cases.
Collected by: Jean-Pierre Beckerich
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