Posted on 06/11/2021 11:51:04 AM PDT by Red Badger
At 563 carats, the Star of India is the world’s largest gem-quality blue star sapphire, and is approximately 2 billion years old. (Image credit: D. Finnin/Copyright AMNH)
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What does the legendary Star of India — a 563-carat star sapphire the size of a golf ball — have in common with a 35-million-year-old petrified redwood slab; a massive cluster of sword-like crystals that looks like it came from "Game of Thrones;" and a 5-ton (4.5-metric ton) stone pillar that can "sing?"
You can see all of them, along with 5,000 other amazing stones, in the newly renovated Mignone Hall of Gems and Minerals at the American Museum of Natural History (AMNH) in New York City, which is reopening after a four-year closure on Saturday (June 12). There, one-of-a-kind precious gems appear alongside odd-looking rocks — some of which date to billions of years ago — that have been uniquely warped and twisted by extreme temperatures and pressures.
Individually and together, these objects tell a story of the diverse geologic processes that shape minerals on Earth's surface and deep inside our planet, beginning when the world was young and continuing to this day, museum representatives told Live Science.
Related: 13 mysterious and cursed gemstones
The Star of India, which formed about a billion years ago, was discovered in Sri Lanka in the 18th century. It is one of the best-known gems in the world, in part because it was famously and brazenly stolen from AMNH in 1964, along with several more of the museum's prized stones, by a pair of thieves named Jack "Murf the Surf" Murphy and Allan Kuhn, Smithsonian reported in 2014, on the heist's 50th anniversary. (The one-of-a-kind sapphire was recovered and went back on display in 1965).
(Excerpt) Read more at livescience.com ...
Very punny, Nully!
:o])
I’m feeling the years, myself.
Kitteh says it’s time to get up and get with it!
Off to the shower. Things may look better then.
I got dressed.
The shower was depressing. Somehow, in the other showers I’ve had since moving in a week ago, I missed the part about the bathroom fixtures not being cleaned, including the shower. (No tub, just a shower stall.)
I’m at the half-way point in dressing. I need to take my pills and see if my attitude improves. Right now, I don’t care. Not good.
BRB.
Thank you. It was just sitting there.
Good morning, all. Happy Humph Day!
Good morning, all. Happy Humph Day!
If you care that you don’t care, that’s a start.
At this moment, I don’t care that I don’t care. But there are other things that are occupying my frontal cortex (or whatever that thing is in the front of your brain) so maybe later.
Right now, I’m trying to find my USB hub. I need it. Desperately.
It certainly sounds like you are getting a lot done!!
Academy has some really comfy, folding chairs... tilt all the way back to see the stars!
“Innocence”
and good grief... Humph Day already? I need to find some of that time slowing salve and start using it...
We have a leaning-back chair and a rocking chair already.
Good morning!
DP bought some new kitchen items, so I’m cleaning out the cupboards to try to find a place for them.
I’m at a standstill. The printer, which was working just fine when I left Happy Valley, is insisting on having its own way here in Dogpatch. It keeps giving me the “Busy” message.
So I contacted Epson. Although its past it’s warranty period, I’m really hoping that I don’t have to get a new printer.
In the meantime, things are being Done, in spite of Delays of one kind or another.
Still cleaning. Several young people - Tom, Sally, Vlad - have used various dishes and not cleaned them up all that well.
ARRGH!!!
Until I had laser surgery on my cataracts, my dishes were often “not cleaned up all that well.” The scar tissue has to be removed from the right lens because my dishes are unexplainably dirty again and I can’t attribute it to anyone else! (Darnit!) ;o]
I thought this would be a productive day but I’m stuck waiting for emails and for people to answer their phones. The stress is horrendous!
It has warmed up a bit since yesterday. It was 45 fs when I walked the dog this morning.
Elen, USMC, wandered through and left again, when there was nothing going on except suggestions for ways she could make herself useful.
Patrick is going to take some extraneous kitchen items to Goodwill for me.
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