Minerals are physical objects, rooted in time and formed through complex planetary processes. So why don’t scientists classify them that way? A philosopher and two Earth scientists recently asked that ...

Swedish physician, botanist and zoologist Carl von Linné is today famous as the father of binomial nomenclature, a system of naming species of living things by giving each a name composed of two parts ...

Washington, DC--The first minerals to form in the universe were nanocrystalline diamonds, which condensed from gases ejected when the first generation of stars exploded. Diamonds that crystallize ...

Minerals are geologic time capsules of the environments in which they form. With the right approach, their mysteries can be cracked open to reveal key features of the ancient Earth or other planets.

CU Boulder philosopher and planetary scientists at Carnegie Institution for Science argue that existing system of mineral classification fails to account for ‘mineral evolution’ Maybe a diamond is ...

A system of categorization that reflects not just a mineral's chemistry and crystalline structure, but also the physical, chemical, or biological processes by which it formed, would be capable of ...