Françoisite-(Nd)

One fine Françoisite-(Ce) and Françoisite-(Nd) specimen from Switzerland, its type locality. Françoisite was only just named in 1988 by P. Piret, M. Deliens and J. Piret-Meunier in honor of Dr. Armand François (Aljustrel, Portugal, December 28th 1922 – ), a Belgian geologist and the former director of the Geology Department of Gécamine, a Zaïrian mining company. Its hardness is 3 and its specific gravity is 4.06. The Françoisite-(Ce) is specifically the yellow crystals on the brownish matrix. Other than that this is one cool specimen representing a natural sample of Neodymium, Cerium, and Samarium, and that it’s a recently named mineral that can be found in only six places around the world in six various countries, none of which are the USA or in the Western Hemisphere, there’s not much more that can be said about this, but it’s surely one cool rock!