There is only one specimen of the rarest mineral on Earth, and it's from Myanmar.
Most human eyes have seen the mystical beauty of quartz, possibly without knowing it is the most common mineral on Earth, but which is the rarest?
However, little is known about kyawthuite, so let's move on to the second-rarest mineral in existence. This is painite, which appears as deep red hexagonal crystals . Though painite is now more easily found than it used to be, this mineral is still rare, and its chemical structure makes it something of a scientific enigma.
The very first painite crystal discovered, known as painite #1, was later analyzed by Rossman. His latest painite study was published in Mineralogical Magazine in 2018. Rossman also found there was an error in the chemical makeup originally determined by scientists at the British Museum. While they had correctly identified aluminum, boron, calcium and oxygen, the element zirconium was missing. Another thing Rossman found out was what gave painite its reddish hue; It has trace amounts of vanadium and chromium that might make it deceptively appear like a ruby.
Rossman has had many crystals suspected to be painite sent to him for identification. Some have been hidden in plain sight for decades, as they were often stashed in bags of rough gemstones or in the hands of dealers and collectors who misidentified them.
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