Location Map of the American Museum of Natural History
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The Harry Frank Guggenheim Hall of Minerals is a vast, darkened room in which hundreds of unusual and rare specimens glow under brilliant spotlights. It adjoins the Morgan Memorial Hall of gems, which contains a variety of rare displays.
On display are many renowned pieces that are chosen from among the museum's more than 100,000 specimens. Included among these are the Patricia Emerald, a 632 carat (126 g), 12 sided stone that is considered to be one of the world's most fabulous emeralds. It was discovered during the 1920s in a mine high in the Colombian Andes and was named for the mine-owner's daughter. The Patricia is one of the few, large, gem quality emeralds that remains uncut. Also on display is the 563 carat (113 g) Star of India, the largest, and most famous, star sapphire in the world. It was discovered over 300 years ago in Sri Lanka, most likely in the sands of ancient river beds from where star sapphires continue to be found today. It was donated to the museum by the financier J.P. Morgan. The thin, radiant, six pointed 'star', or 'asterism', is created by incoming light that reflects from needle-like crystals of the mineral rutile which are found within the sapphire. The Star of India is polished into the shape of a cabochon, or dome, to enhance the star's beauty. Among other notable specimens on display are the 596 pound Brazilian Princess topaz, the largest topaz in the world, and a four, one half ton specimen of blue azurite/malachite ore that was found in the Copper Queen Mine in Bisbee Arizona at the turn of the century, the padparadschan sapphire from Sri Lanka whose name means "lotus flower". It is unique because it is not blue but an orange color.
Hall of Meteorites
The Hall of Meteorites contain some of the finest specimens in the world including Ahnichito, a 34 ton section of the 200 ton 'Cape York meteorite' which was found at the location of that name in Greenland. The meteorite's great weight requires support by columns that extend through the floor and into the bedrock below the museum. The hall also contain extra-solar nanodiamonds (diamonds with dimensions on the [nanometer] level) more than 5 billion years old. These were extracted from a meteorite sample through chemical means, and they are so small that many thousands of trillions of these fit into less than a cubic centimeter.
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