{"id":208576,"date":"2019-04-06T01:31:35","date_gmt":"2019-04-06T05:31:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/?p=208576"},"modified":"2019-04-06T01:31:35","modified_gmt":"2019-04-06T05:31:35","slug":"canadian-arctic-has-all-the-mineral-ingredients-for-prized-blue-gemstones","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/2019\/04\/06\/canadian-arctic-has-all-the-mineral-ingredients-for-prized-blue-gemstones\/","title":{"rendered":"Canadian Arctic has all the mineral ingredients for prized blue gemstones"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>
FILE: An ice-covered fjord on Baffin Island, with Davis Strait in the background (Photo By Nasa.gov, Public Domain<\/a>)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

VANCOUVER \u2013 Baffin Island holds some of its treasures in plain sight with rocks that produce rare gems sitting exposed to the elements, scientists say.<\/p>\n

A new study from the University of British Columbia shows the area is home to a mineral that is prized by jewellers and collectors.<\/p>\n

Study co-author Philippe Belley said in an interview that cobalt-blue spinel, \u201cwhich is a ridiculously rare gemstone\u201d gets a lot of interest from gemologists and jewellers but there’s not enough supply.<\/p>\n

The most significant source of the gems is Vietnam, and even then production is limited, said Belley, who’s a PhD graduate within the department of earth, ocean and atmospheric sciences.<\/p>\n

He and report co-author UBC mineralogist Lee Groat conducted the first scientific study of the cobalt-blue spinel in Canada.<\/p>\n

Baffin Island is \u201creally unique\u201d because it has all the \u201cright ingredients\u201d needed to produce coloured gemstones but the area is \u201cvirtually\u201d unexplored, Belley said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe rock is extremely well exposed so not only is it easy to see if you have a gem occurrence by just walking on the surface and doing geological mapping, but its also suitable for remote detection methods using drones and satellites to collect data on the rocks.\u201d<\/p>\n

Using remote detection can’t be done in most other gem-producing areas because of plant cover or challenging terrain, Belley said.<\/p>\n

The researchers analysed 14 occurrences of spinel on Baffin Island, including two of cobalt-blue spinel, to better understand how it forms.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt’s finding the right chemical components in the right concentration,\u201d he said. \u201cWe found that most gem occurrences on Baffin Island were formed from the transformation of a mixture of mud and magnesium-rich limestone under high temperature and pressure.\u201d<\/p>\n

They found it was formed 1.8 billion years ago at temperatures of about 800 C, but cobalt was only present in high-enough concentrations to produce gem-quality stones in small, localized areas.<\/p>\n

Baffin Island spinel contains up to 500 parts-per-million of cobalt, giving it a vivid blue colour comparable to the best sources worldwide, Belley said in the news release.<\/p>\n

Spinel also comes in red, pink and violet, Belley said.<\/p>\n

Other gems found on Baffin Island include Beluga sapphires, used in the Queen’s sapphire jubilee brooch, and lapis lazuli, a rock used as a gemstone by the Egyptians, he said.<\/p>\n

Mining for the gems on Baffin Island wouldn’t necessarily leave a large geographical footprint, he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cMost gemstones are either mined from a relatively small mine and a lot of them a mined by one or a few people or families around the world, which is called artisanal mining.\u201d<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

VANCOUVER \u2013 Baffin Island holds some of its treasures in plain sight with rocks that produce rare gems sitting exposed …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":44,"featured_media":208578,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18,16],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-208576","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news-ca","category-news","mauthors-the-canadian-press"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/208576","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/44"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=208576"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/208576\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":208580,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/208576\/revisions\/208580"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/208578"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=208576"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=208576"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=208576"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}