While visiting Harvard’s natural history museum on a trip to Boston, i’ve seen some minerals (or crystals. Not exactly sure of the difference between them) that seems to have naturally formed into near perfect cubes. How is that possible?
It seemed to be most frequent in pyrite.
Thanks in advance!
(Tagged as chemistry, but not sure if it fits)
In: Chemistry
Minerals have a crystal habit. At a fundamental level, atoms in crystalline arrange themselves in such a way as to minimise their internal energy. For some minerals, this is a cubic structure. Under optimal crystallisation conditions, crystals can get quite large and have few defects.
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