Scientists uncover one of rarest minerals on Earth hidden in 75 year-old handwritten letter
A team of scientists have uncovered one of the rarest minerals on Earth that was hidden in a 75-year-old handwritten letter.
This discovery was made during a survey of an old mineral collection where fragments of Humboldtine were found.
Humboldtine is a rare, naturally occurring mineral and is also known as the iron salt of oxalic acid. Humboldtine is known for its scarcity and its association with specific geological conditions involving iron-rich rocks and natural acids.
The mineral was first discovered by German mineralogist August Breithaupt in a weathered brown coal deposit in the Czech Republic.
Advert
It is so rare that it has only ever been found in roughly 30 locations around the world, including quarries and mines in Germany, Brazil, the UK, Canada, the US, Hungary, the Czech Republic, and Italy.
This recent discovery was made in a letter from a coal mine owner in Bavaria, Germany, that dates back to 1949.
In the letter, it details the existence of Humboldtine within coal seams of the Matthiaszeche, a former open-pit mine for brown coal near Schwandorf, which is a town on the river Naab.
Roland Eichhorn, who is the head of the geological department at the LfU Bayern in Germany, was interested in the letter and led a team to analyze the mineral collection, which contains over 130,000 rock and mineral samples.
Samples of Humboldtine were uncovered but if anyone is hoping to venture to the coal mine themselves in search of more, then we have bad news.
The Matthiaszeche closed back in 1966 and later flooded, meaning there is no chance of uncovering more Humboldtine from the site.
More discoveries have been made in recent years
In other discovery news, a long-lost ship, which is believed to have sunk after being targeted by one of the world’s most infamous pirates, has been recovered.
A team of archeologists believe they may have stumbled upon the wreckage of a Portuguese ship once known as Nossa Senhora do Cabo which sank over 300 years ago along the northeast coast of Madagascar, near the island of Nosy Borhan.
It is thought that the ship might have been attacked by the notorious French pirate, Oliver 'The Buzzard' Levasseur.
Two US researchers, Brandon Clifford and Mark Agostini, from the Centre for Historic Shipwreck Preservation, uncovered a whopping 3,000 artefacts from the boat, and the entire loot is estimated to be worth a total of $138 million today.