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MineralsRingwoodite

13th Mar 2014 11:20 UTCRonnie Van Dommelen 🌟 Manager

Interesting article. Says this is the first terrestrial discovery of ringwoodite!

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/03/140312150229.htm

14th Mar 2014 10:04 UTCCharles F. McGuire II

Biographical article on Mr. Ringwood can be found at: http://rses.anu.edu.au/professor-alfred-edward-ringwood

14th Mar 2014 13:20 UTCBill Cordua 🌟 Manager

This is a neat find, that will affect how geologists think about and model mantle processes BUT the linked article really unnecessarily sensationalizes it. "Water-rich gem" and "vast oceans" indeed. First, the ringwoodite found was a fleck 40 micrometers across included in a tiny diamond. Ringwoodite is a polymorph of olivine, in the article called "peridot" to emphasize the gemmy variety. A 40 micrometer fleck of ringwoodite wouldn't make much of a gem stone. Ringwoodite can include water in its structure - say about 1% in this case. IF this is typical and IF ringwoodite is common in the mantle (both reasonable assumptions) then this means there is a lot of water bound up in ringwoodite in certain parts of the mantle because the mantle is a big place - actually ringwoodite would dominate in only part of the mantle, but still... But the water is structurally bound up inside the mineral. The reference to "vast oceans" gives an impression of something out of Jules Verne - huge caverns of water sloshing about, perhaps with pleisiosaurs swimming in it? Okay, enough rant. A really cool find but lets keep it in perspective.

14th Mar 2014 14:00 UTCRonnie Van Dommelen 🌟 Manager

Bill

Yes, I thought the same things. I did not link the scientific Nature article just out of lack of time. The locality can also be added into the database - again I have not done that. Maybe this evening...

14th Mar 2014 16:43 UTCBill Cordua 🌟 Manager

Hi Ronnie - my comments were not directed at you - but at whoever wrote up the linked article. I'm glad you posted it. I found another article with the head line "Satanic hell diamond tells of a sunless sea". First I laughed at that. Then it struck me that that was what it took to get people to pay attention to science. Then I wanted to cry. Take care!

14th Mar 2014 17:47 UTCVik Vanrusselt Expert

Apparently this WASN'T the FIRST terrestrial find of Ringwoodite, as mentioned by Peter Haas in this similar thread that I started earlier this week:

http://www.mindat.org/mesg-6-318754.html

Vik

15th Mar 2014 17:53 UTCAnonymous User

Here's another article on the subject, glad I ran a search for ringwoodite before I posted it. Interesting stuff!

Vice Article

30th Mar 2014 14:24 UTCPeter Haas

The link at the head of the page is broken.

19th Jan 2021 15:39 UTCRonnie Van Dommelen 🌟 Manager

The following paper (https://advances.sciencemag.org/content/6/2/eaay7893), mentions a 'ringwoodite-ahrensite solid solution'. Should/can that be added to MinDat?

19th Jan 2021 21:02 UTCRalph S Bottrill 🌟 Manager

There is no info on how complete the series is; maybe we just make a note on both pages that there is some solid solution between the two?

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