Tag: minerals
Chard: what is it?
Red Swiss chard is one of the varieties of chard. © Wikimedia Commons Chard is a vegetable whose leaves and petioles are eaten, and which looks a lot like beets.…
Microbes and minerals may have triggered Earth’s oxygenation
In its early days, our Earth was poor in oxygen. And researchers are still wondering what caused our atmosphere to shift from this stable state to the equally stable one…
Thermal spring: what is it?
Thermal springs, or hot springs, are natural resurgences of highly mineralized hot water. If they are often associated with magmatic processes and the proximity of a volcanic system, their presence…
The current continental crust differs from the primitive earth’s crust
At the very beginning, our Planet was only molten rocks. The cooling of its surface gradually formed the primitive continental crust which would allow to install the future favorable conditions…
Andesitis: what is it?
Andesites are part of the large family of volcanic rocks. Of color Light gray that can go to black, andesite has a microlitic structure, which means that the majority of…
The primitive moon would have cooled in just 20 million years!
If the circumstances of the formation of the Moon are now rather well defined, the way in which our natural satellite evolved thermally during the early stages of its history…
The minerals of the world in 19 photos
Main constituents of rocks, minerals are substances that have a chemical composition and properties physical well defined. They are formed during the different stages of the life of the planets:…
The enigmatic formation of the first continental crust
The continental crust which forms the continents that we know today was formed during the first stages of the Earth’s evolution, in the Hadean style. During this period, the early…
When nature plays Tetris to shape the structure of minerals
Who has never marveled at the perfection of a quartz crystal or the cubic shape so clean of a pyrite crystal? The perfection of certain crystals may suggest that the…
Quiz: do you recognize these minerals?
Rare and precious or very common, there are now nearly 5,000 known minerals and we are discovering new ones every year! Can you recognize these 10 minerals? You will also…