Phantom quartz crystals are quartz crystals that have another crystal within, giving the appearance of a “phantom” crystal inside. The phantom crystal is often another crystal that has other mineral inclusions, usually deposited on its surface. At some point during the crystal’s development, there was a pause in its growth, and another mineral was deposited on the crystal’s surface. After that, conditions became favorable for its growth, and the crystal continued to develop again. The deposited mineral is usually an opaque mineral, and therefore, shows up prominently within the crystal, although there are also instances where there are no secondary
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Archives for Crystal formation
Quartz crystal configurations
There are many kinds of quartz crystal configurations or formations which possess specific properties unique to that configuration. While the general properties of quartz are still there, having a special configuration imbues them with some qualities of its own. The double terminated quartz crystal is one such special formation; another is the laser wand crystal; but there are many others as well. Let’s look at some of the other ones today: Twin quartz crystal Twin quartz crystals are easily recognized as two or more crystals growing together both in parallel or opposing alignments to each other, and are classified as
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Internal structure of crystals and gems
Now remember the old elemental chart you used to refer to for chemistry lessons at school? Known as the Periodic table, this chart was first devised by a Russian chemist named Dmitri Mendeleev in 1869 as a means of showing the recurring changes in the properties of the elements. Minerals are formed from one or a combination of two or more elements. Think of the earth as one giant onion with layers of skins like onions do. Broadly speaking, our earth has an outer layer of solid crust, which is where all the living things on earth are on, a
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