Red beryl, formerly known as bixbite and marketed as red emerald or scarlet emerald, is an extremely rare variety of beryl as well as one of the rarest minerals on Earth. The gem gets its red color from

manganese Manganese is a chemical element with the symbol Mn and atomic number 25. It is a hard, brittle, silvery metal, often found in minerals in combination with iron. Manganese is a transition metal with a multifaceted array of industrial alloy use ...

ions embedded inside of

beryllium Beryllium is a chemical element with the symbol Be and atomic number 4. It is a steel-gray, strong, lightweight and brittle alkaline earth metal. It is a divalent element that occurs naturally only in combination with other elements to form mi ...

aluminium Aluminium (aluminum in American and Canadian English) is a chemical element with the symbol Al and atomic number 13. Aluminium has a density lower than those of other common metals, at approximately one third that of steel. I ...

cyclosilicate crystals. The color of red beryl is stable up to . Red Beryl can come in various tints like strawberry, bright ruby, cherry, and orange. The largest crystals of red beryl are about wide and long. However, most crystals are under long. Recently, the red variety of

Pezzottaite Pezzottaite, marketed under the name raspberyl or raspberry beryl, is a mineral species first recognized by the International Mineralogical Association in September 2003. Pezzottaite is a caesium analogue of beryl, a silicate of caesium, beryll ...

has been sold in markets as red beryl by some sellers.

Deposits and rarity of the mineral

Red beryl was discovered in 1904 by Maynard Bixby in the

Wah Wah mountains The Wah Wah Mountains are a north-south trending range in west-central Utah, part of the larger Basin and Range Province. It is bounded by Pine Valley to the west, Wah Wah Valley to the east, the Escalante Desert to the south, and on trend with ...

Utah Utah ( , ) is a state in the Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. Utah is a landlocked U.S. state bordered to its east by Colorado, to its northeast by Wyoming, to its north by Idaho, to its south by Arizona, and to it ...

. In 1912 the gem was named bixbite by Alfred Eppler after Maynard Bixby. The old synonym "bixbite" is deprecated, since it can cause confusion with the mineral

bixbyite Bixbyite is a manganese iron oxide mineral with chemical formula: (Mn,Fe)2O3. The iron/manganese ratio is quite variable and many specimens have almost no iron. It is a metallic dark black with a Mohs hardness of 6.0 - 6.5. It is a somewhat rare ...

. The greatest concentration of gem-grade red beryl comes from the Ruby-Violet Claim in the Wah Wah Mountains of mid-western Utah, discovered in 1958 by Lamar Hodges, of

Fillmore, Utah Fillmore is a city and the county seat of Millard County, Utah, United States. The population was 2,435 at the 2010 United States Census. It is named for the thirteenth President of the United States, US President Millard Fillmore, who was in of ...

, while he was prospecting for

uranium Uranium is a chemical element with the symbol U and atomic number 92. It is a silvery-grey metal in the actinide series of the periodic table. A uranium atom has 92 protons and 92 electrons, of which 6 are valence electrons. Uranium is weak ...

. Red beryl is very rare and has been reported only from a handful of locations:

Wah Wah Mountains The Wah Wah Mountains are a north-south trending range in west-central Utah, part of the larger Basin and Range Province. It is bounded by Pine Valley to the west, Wah Wah Valley to the east, the Escalante Desert to the south, and on trend with ...

, Paramount Canyon, Round Mountain and Juab County. This gem is also a thousand times more rare than gold. According to the

Utah Geological Survey The Utah Geological Survey is based in Salt Lake City, Utah, United States. It also has an office in Cedar City, Utah. It is a division of the

they estimated that one red beryl is found for every 150,000 diamonds. According to

Gemmological Association of Great Britain The Gemmological Association of Great Britain (Gem-A) is an international gemmology education and qualifications body based in the United Kingdom. History Gem-A dates back to 1908 when a gemmological committee was established by ''The National A ...

a 2 carat red beryl has the same rarity as a 40 carat diamond. Red beryl is said to be roughly the same price or more valuable than

emerald Emerald is a gemstone and a variety of the mineral beryl (Be3Al2(SiO3)6) colored green by trace amounts of chromium or sometimes vanadium.Hurlbut, Cornelius S. Jr. and Kammerling, Robert C. (1991) ''Gemology'', John Wiley & Sons, New York, p ...

although it is a hundred times rarer than emerald. Its rarity has made it less popular but red beryl crystals that are over 1 carat can sell for US$ 20,000. In 2008, one carat can sell for

US$ The United States dollar (symbol: $; code: USD; also abbreviated US$ or U.S. Dollar, to distinguish it from other dollar-denominated currencies; referred to as the dollar, U.S. dollar, American dollar, or colloquially buck) is the official ...

5000 or more.

Characteristics

Red beryl rough crystals can be easily distinguished by hexagonal crystal systems. This gem has been known to be confused with

pezzottaite Pezzottaite, marketed under the name raspberyl or raspberry beryl, is a mineral species first recognized by the International Mineralogical Association in September 2003. Pezzottaite is a caesium analogue of beryl, a silicate of caesium, beryll ...

, a

caesium Caesium (IUPAC spelling) (or cesium in American English) is a chemical element with the symbol Cs and atomic number 55. It is a soft, silvery-golden alkali metal with a melting point of , which makes it one of only five elemental metals that a ...

analog of beryl, that has been found in Madagascar and more recently Afghanistan; cut gems of the two varieties can be distinguished from their difference in

refractive index In optics, the refractive index (or refraction index) of an optical medium is a dimensionless number that gives the indication of the light bending ability of that medium. The refractive index determines how much the path of light is bent, or ...

. Like emerald and unlike most other varieties of beryl, red beryl is usually highly included. Red beryl has inclusions like feathers and fractures. Some mineral inclusions include

quartz Quartz is a hard, crystalline mineral composed of silica (silicon dioxide). The atoms are linked in a continuous framework of SiO4 silicon-oxygen tetrahedra, with each oxygen being shared between two tetrahedra, giving an overall chemical form ...

feldspar Feldspars are a group of rock-forming aluminium tectosilicate minerals, also containing other cations such as sodium, calcium, potassium, or barium. The most common members of the feldspar group are the ''plagioclase'' (sodium-calcium) feldsp ...

hematite Hematite (), also spelled as haematite, is a common iron oxide compound with the formula, Fe2O3 and is widely found in rocks and soils. Hematite crystals belong to the rhombohedral lattice system which is designated the alpha polymorph of . ...

, and

Formation

While gem beryls are ordinarily found in

pegmatites A pegmatite is an igneous rock showing a very coarse texture, with large interlocking crystals usually greater in size than and sometimes greater than . Most pegmatites are composed of quartz, feldspar, and mica, having a similar silicic comp ...

and certain

metamorphic rock Metamorphic rocks arise from the transformation of existing rock to new types of rock in a process called metamorphism. The original rock (protolith) is subjected to temperatures greater than and, often, elevated pressure of or more, causin ...

, red beryl forms in topaz-bearing

rhyolites Rhyolite ( ) is the most silica-rich of volcanic rocks. It is generally glassy or fine-grained (aphanitic) in texture, but may be porphyritic, containing larger mineral crystals (phenocrysts) in an otherwise fine-grained groundmass. The mineral ...

. It is formed by crystallizing under low pressure and high temperature from a pneumatolytic phase along fractures or within near-surface

miarolitic cavities Miarolitic cavities (or ''miarolitic texture'') are typically crystal-lined irregular cavities or vugs most commonly found in granitic pegmatites, and also in a variety of igneous rocks. The central portions of pegmatites are often miarolitic as ...

of the rhyolite. Associated minerals include bixbyite,

, orthoclase,

topaz Topaz is a silicate mineral of aluminium and fluorine with the chemical formula Al Si O( F, OH). It is used as a gemstone in jewelry and other adornments. Common topaz in its natural state is colorless, though trace element impurities can mak ...

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 ...

pseudobrookite Pseudobrookite is an iron titanium oxide mineral with formula: Fe2TiO5 or (Fe3+,Fe2+)2(2+)O5. Discovery and occurrence Pseudobrookite was first described in 1878 for an occurrence in Uroi Hill (Arany Hill), Simeria, Hunedoara County, Romania. The ...

and

. The dark red color is attributed to ions. Synthetic red beryl is also produced.

References

{{reflist Beryl group Hexagonal minerals