Whenever I hear the word "dolomite" I want to run away. I don't know any palaeontologist who likes the stuff and I feel like it has been following me around a fair bit. Back home I live on top of the Magnesian Limestone, which is dolomite, and because of that fossils are sparse. Dolomite is limestone which has been altered (to simplify a tad) and the process is not good for any fossils in the rock. Dolomite was also heavily present during my mapping trip in Spain, though it did give quite a dramatic landscape.
 |
The dolomite ridge known as "Las Cuchilleras". |
Even though the dolomite has created some interesting topography, I still couldn't have imagined anyone thinking of it as nice to look at. Until today that is. We were shown images of the results of cathodoluminescence on dolomite:
 |
On the left are the samples before luminescence. |
How nice are they! To me they conjure up images of the classical understanding of Hell, the sort found in Dante's
Inferno. Have some more:
No comments:
Post a Comment