Lily mine – September 30
The Lily mine is one of very few oxidizied mineral deposits in Peru. The oxidation process at Lily has produced interesting specimens of copper hydroxychlorides, namely atacamite and clinoatacamite. These two species have the same chemistry, Cu2Cl(OH)3, but different atomic arrangements. Once believed to be a polymorph of atacamite, paratacamite requires a minor impurity to stabilize rhombohedral symmetry. Consequently, paratacamite is not a polymorph of atacamite. However, some pseudorhombohedral crystals are known which are very close to the ideal formula, but they actually have monoclinic symmetry. Jambor et al. (1996) named these pseudorhombohedral crystals clinoatacamite. At the Lily mine, clinoatacamite crystals reach 1.3 cm across, a best of species find. Hence, they are the stars of this gallery.
This gallery contains 22 specimens.
 #0993 Atacamite |
#0986 Atacamite |
#0985 Clinoatacamite |
#0995 Clinoatacamite |
#0994 Clinoatacamite |
#0992 Clinoatacamite |
#0990 Clinoatacamite |
#0989 Clinoatacamite |
#0988 Clinoatacamite |
#0987 Clinoatacamite |
#0984 Clinoatacamite |
#0983 Clinoatacamite |
#0982 Clinoatacamite |
#0981 Clinoatacamite |
#0980 Clinoatacamite |
#0979 Clinoatacamite |
#0978 Clinoatacamite |
#0977 Clinoatacamite |
#0976 Clinoatacamite |
#0974 Clinoatacamite on Quartz |
#0975 Clinoatacamite on Quartz |
#0991 Clinoatacamite, Quartz, Gypsum |
