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What mineral property observes the number and angle of crystal faces?
Mineral Properties
| Question | Answer |
|---|---|
| To measure density what test do you perform? | You find the mass per unit of volume. |
| To measure crystal system what do you do? | You observe number and angle of crystal faces. |
| To measure Cleavage and Fracture what tests do you do? | You break minerals apart to see if it splits along flat surfaces. |
What is observing number and angle of crystal faces?
Density. Observe number and angle of crystal faces. Crystal structures. Break mineral apart to see if it splits along flat surfaces.
What are crystal faces?
crystal face One of the relatively flat surfaces by which a crystal is bounded. Faces are produced naturally during the process of crystal growth. Cut and polished gemstones are bounded by plane faces which are often produced artificially and which, therefore, are not crystal faces.
What is a crystal and what determines a crystals shape?
What is a crystal and what determines its shape? A crystal is a solid geometric form of minerals produced by a repeating pattern that is present throughout the mineral. Also a crystal’s shape is determined by the arrangement of the atoms within the crystal. Minerals generally have the same chemical composition though.
What are minerals in chemistry?
Mineral is a naturally occurring inorganic solid with a definite chemical composition and a crystalline structure. A mineral is composed of a single element or compound. By definition, a mineral is a naturally occurring inorganic substance with a definite chemical composition and ordered atomic structure.
What are the five characteristics of a mineral?
List the five characteristics necessary for a substance to be a mineral. solid, naturally occurring, inorganic, fixed chemical composition, and crystalline structure. In general what are three ways in which minerals form?
What do you need to know about broken minerals?
The geometric shape of broken fragments of minerals is an important clue for identification. However, you may not be allowed to break samples you study, or the study sample may be an aggregate of small or microscopic crystals which make it difficult (or impossible) for you to determine cleavage directions and angles.
Can a cubic crystal have six identical faces?
So crystals with six identical faces (a cube) are possible. Minerals with shoe-box shaped unit cells cannot form cubic crystals. In the next chapter we will look closer at the possible unit cell shapes and the crystals they may form.
Why do some crystals have more symmetry than others?
If a crystal shows some kind of symmetry, the atoms within it must have at least that much symmetry. They may have more. For example, as we will see later in this chapter, minerals that form dodecahedral, octahedral or tetrahedral crystals have cubic atomic arrangements within them, even though the crystals are not cubes.