A new, curious mineral has been discovered inside a diamond unearthed from a mine in Koffiefontein, South Africa. It has been described in the journal American Mineralogist.
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The mineral has been named goldschmidtite, after Victor Moritz Goldschmidt, the Norwegian scientist acknowledged as the founder of modern geochemistry.
Goldschmidtite has an unusual chemical signature for a mineral from Earth’s mantle. While the mantle is dominated by elements such as magnesium and iron, goldschmidtite has high concentrations of niobium, potassium and the rare earth elements lanthanum and cerium.
For potassium and niobium to constitute a major proportion of this mineral, it must have formed under exceptional processes that concentrated these unusual elements.
It was found as single grain of the mineral in the diamond. it is described as dark green and opaque.
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