Continuing the topic of beryl, let's talk about its colorless variety. Colorless beryls are usually represented by lithium-sodium rosterite or goshenite. Goshenite received its name in 1844 in honor of the settlement in which it was first found. The first deposits of this mineral were discovered in the city of Goshen in the US state of Massachusetts. The name "rosterite" was given in honor of the researcher G. Rosterite.
This type of beryl is not as popular as aquamarine or emerald, but goshenite is considered the purest of all beryls and before the invention of cubic zirconia, colorless beryls were also successfully used as imitations of diamonds. Goshenite forms prismatic, tabular, lamellar crystals, is formed in various granite pegmatites, in hydrothermal high-temperature quartz veins, having a post-magmatic origin. It is most often found in association with quartz, albite, microcline, muscovite, sherl, topaz, lepidolite, clevelandite and elbaite.
Goshenite deposits are found in Brazil, Mexico, the USA ( in the states of Alabama, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Virginia), Canada, Russia, Zimbabwe, Namibia, Bulgaria, Italy, the Czech Republic, Austria, China, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Burma, Sri Lanka. By themselves, transparent colorless beryls are devoid of optical effects and do not have much jewelry value. Therefore, they are mainly used as a material for ennobling, in particular, colorless goshenite can be converted into blue beryl of the maxis type by heat treatment and subsequent intensive irradiation, which we will discuss in one of the following posts.
