Leucophoenicite is a mineral with formula Mn₇(SiO₄)₃(OH)₂. Generally brown to red or pink in color, the mineral gets its name from the

Greek Greek may refer to: Greece Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group. *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family. **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...

words meaning "pale purple-red". Leucophoenicite was discovered in

New Jersey New Jersey is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Northeastern regions of the United States. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York; on the east, southeast, and south by the Atlantic Ocean; on the west by the Delawa ...

, US and identified as a new mineral in 1899.

Description

Leucophoenicite is normally brown, light purple-red, raspberry-red or pink in color; in thin section it is rose-red to colorless. The name is derived from the Greek words ''leukos'', meaning "pale", and ', meaning "purple-red", in reference to its common coloring. Leucophoenicite typically occurs as isolated grains or it has granular massive

habit A habit (or wont as a humorous and formal term) is a routine of behavior that is repeated regularly and tends to occur subconsciously.

. Crystals of the mineral, which occur rarely, are slender, prismatic, elongated, and striated. The mineral forms in a low pressure, hydrothermal environment or in a contact zone in the veins and

skarn Skarns or tactites are hard, coarse-grained metamorphic rocks that form by a process called metasomatism. Skarns tend to be rich in calcium-magnesium-iron-manganese-aluminium silicate minerals, which are also referred to as calc-silicate mineral ...

s of a stratiform Zn- Mn ore body. Leucophoenicite is a member of the

humite group Humite is a mineral found in the volcanically ejected masses of Vesuvius Mount Vesuvius ( ; it, Vesuvio ; nap, 'O Vesuvio , also or ; la, Vesuvius , also , or ) is a somma-stratovolcano located on the Gulf of Naples in Campania, Ital ...

. It has been found in association with

barite Baryte, barite or barytes ( or ) is a mineral consisting of barium sulfate ( Ba S O4). Baryte is generally white or colorless, and is the main source of the element barium. The ''baryte group'' consists of baryte, celestine (strontium sulfate), ...

, barysilite,

calcite Calcite is a carbonate mineral and the most stable polymorph of calcium carbonate (CaCO3). It is a very common mineral, particularly as a component of limestone. Calcite defines hardness 3 on the Mohs scale of mineral hardness, based on scratc ...

copper Copper is a chemical element with the symbol Cu (from la, cuprum) and atomic number 29. It is a soft, malleable, and ductile metal with very high thermal and electrical conductivity. A freshly exposed surface of pure copper has a pinkis ...

franklinite Franklinite is an oxide mineral belonging to the normal spinel subgroup's iron (Fe) series, with the formula ZnFe3+2O4. As with another spinel member magnetite, both ferrous (2+) and ferric (3+) iron may be present in Franklinite samples. Di ...

garnet Garnets () are a group of silicate minerals that have been used since the Bronze Age as gemstones and abrasives. All species of garnets possess similar physical properties and crystal forms, but differ in chemical composition. The different s ...

glaucochroite Glaucochroite is a calcium manganese nesosilicate mineral with formula . It occurs in metamorphosed limestones. It was first described in 1899 in Franklin Furnace, Sussex County, New Jersey Sussex County is the northernmost county in the S ...

hausmannite Hausmannite is a complex oxide of manganese containing both di- and tri-valent manganese. The formula can be represented as Mn2+Mn3+2O4. It belongs to the spinel group and forms tetragonal crystals. Hausmannite is a brown to black metallic minera ...

jerrygibbsite Jerrygibbsite is a rare silicate mineral with the chemical formula . Jerrygibbsite was originally discovered by Pete J. Dunn in 1984, who named it after mineralogist Gerald V. Gibbs (born 1929). It has only been reported from the type locality ...

manganosite Manganosite is a rare mineral composed of manganese(II) oxide MnO. It was first described in 1817 for an occurrence in the Harz Mountains, Saxony-Anhalt, Germany. It has also been reported from Langban and Nordmark, Sweden and at Franklin Furna ...

, pyrochroite,

rhodochrosite Rhodochrosite is a manganese carbonate mineral with chemical composition MnCO3. In its (rare) pure form, it is typically a rose-red color, but impure specimens can be shades of pink to pale brown. It streaks white, and its Mohs hardness varies bet ...

sonolite Sonolite is a mineral with formula Mn9(SiO4)4(OH,F)2. The mineral was discovered in 1960 in the Sono mine in Kyoto Prefecture, Japan. In 1963, it was identified as a new mineral and named after the Sono mine. Description Sonolite is transparent ...

spessartine Spessartine is a nesosilicate, manganese aluminium garnet species, Mn2+3Al2(SiO4)3.Gemological Institute of America, ''GIA Gem Reference Guide'' 1995, This mineral is sometimes mistakenly referred to as ''spessartite''. Spessartine's name is a ...

, sussexite,

tephroite Tephroite is the manganese endmember of the olivine group of nesosilicate minerals with the formula Mn2 Si O4. A solid solution series exists between tephroite and its analogues, the group endmembers fayalite and forsterite. Divalent iron or m ...

vesuvianite Vesuvianite, also known as idocrase, is a green, brown, yellow, or blue silicate mineral. Vesuvianite occurs as tetragonal crystals in skarn deposits and limestones that have been subjected to contact metamorphism. It was first discovered within ...

willemite Willemite is a zinc silicate mineral () and a minor ore of zinc. It is highly fluorescent (green) under shortwave ultraviolet light. It occurs in a variety of colors in daylight, in fibrous masses and apple-green gemmy masses. Troostite is a vari ...

, and

zincite Zincite is the mineral form of zinc oxide ( Zn O). Its crystal form is rare in nature; a notable exception to this is at the Franklin and Sterling Hill Mines in New Jersey, an area also famed for its many fluorescent minerals. It has a hexagon ...

History

Leucophoenicite was first found by J. J. McGovern at the Franklin Mine in New Jersey. The specimen, which consisted mostly of the mineral, was given to C. H. Warren in 1897. First thought to be

clinohedrite Clinohedrite is a rare silicate mineral. Its chemical composition is a hydrous calcium-zinc silicate; CaZn(SiO4)·H2O. It crystallizes in the monoclinic system and typically occurs as veinlets and fracture coatings. It is commonly colorless, wh ...

deeply colored by manganese, it was identified as a new mineral in 1899 by Warren and Samuel Lewis Penfield. The mineral was also discovered around this time from the Buckwheat Pit in New Jersey; however, it was not identified as leucophoenicite until 1906 as it had been overlooked or mistaken for some other substance. The crystallography was first described by Charles Palache in 1910, as Penfield and Warren had been unable to determine even the

crystal system In crystallography, a crystal system is a set of point groups (a group of geometric symmetries with at least one fixed point). A lattice system is a set of Bravais lattices. Space groups are classified into crystal systems according to their poin ...

of leucophoenicite. Material thought to be leucophoenicite, studied in 1928, 1935, and 1967, was in fact a composite of leucophoenicite,

, and

alleghanyite Alleghanyite is a moderately rare humite mineral with formula Mn5(SiO4)2(OH)2, belonging to the nesosilicates class. In general its occurrences are related with metamorphic (metamorphosed) manganese deposits. The mineral is named after Alleghany ...

. The specimens studied by Warren and Penfield in 1899 and Palache in 1910 were both true leucophoenicite.

Distribution

, leucophoenicite has been found in Italy, Japan, Namibia, Romania, South Africa, Sweden, and the US. The

type material In biology, a type is a particular specimen (or in some cases a group of specimens) of an organism to which the scientific name of that organism is formally attached. In other words, a type is an example that serves to anchor or centralizes t ...

is held in the United States at

Yale University Yale University is a Private university, private research university in New Haven, Connecticut. Established in 1701 as the Collegiate School, it is the List of Colonial Colleges, third-oldest institution of higher education in the United Sta ...

and

Harvard University Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of high ...

References

Bibliography

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External links