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General"Published Mineral" thread question

6th Sep 2026 04:45 UTCFrank Casella OP

Is there a discussion thread that shows the actual mineral that was used in a journal publication? I picked up one such mineral assemblage recently, composed of several minerals with inexplicably complex names. If others are in possession of similarly published minerals it might make for an interesting thread.

6th Sep 2026 13:50 UTCChris Emproto Manager

Are you referring to type specimens and figured (photographed) pieces?

6th Sep 2026 14:35 UTCFrank Casella OP

Yes (I think). I'm no mineralogist but those who are, or just collectors, might have the actual specimen that was featured in a (preferably peer reviewed) publication. I assume many such specimens are long shelved away in museums or institutions of higher learning, but a few might be in one of Mindat's discussants' collection. Wouldn't be something appropriate for me to try to accomplish-- would defer to you and others.

6th Sep 2026 17:26 UTCPaul Brandes 🌟 Manager

I can't imagine the actually type specimen used to name a new mineral would be released to the public as those are supposed to be kept by a museum/university for safe keeping and future reference. However, stranger things have happened....

6th Sep 2026 18:48 UTCKevin Conroy Manager

I'm not sure where the holotype specimen of andyrobertsite and calcioandyrobertsite is. Type material is in two museums, but the awesome specimen that this came from...

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/287904220_Andyrobertsite_and_calcioandyrobertsite_Two_new_minerals_from_the_Tsumeb_mine_Tsumeb_Namibia

6th Sep 2026 19:48 UTCAlfredo Petrov 🌟 Manager

Type material is often very scarce. Once long ago when I was hunting for the type locality of povondraite, I asked the Smithsonian if I could look at the type specimen, but was told there was nothing much to look at, just a single polished probe mount.

On the other hand, type specimens can be bigger than what is needed, so they get broken down and bits of them get sold, or traded for other interesting material, or gifted to colleagues in other institutions. So whereas species collectors may often have bits broken off from the type specimen, one hopes the actual official type specimen itself remains deposited in an institution, not in private hands.

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To cite: Ralph, J., Von Bargen, D., Martynov, P., Zhang, J., Que, X., Prabhu, A., Morrison, S. M., Li, W., Chen, W., & Ma, X. (2025). Mindat.org: The open access mineralogy database to accelerate data-intensive geoscience research. American Mineralogist, 110(6), 833–844. doi:10.2138/am-2024-9486.
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