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You may never know what you get when you open a geode-like stone called agate, but a new sample turned out to be more surprising than usual.
The agate, found in Soledad, is a hotspot in southern Brazil and looks like the famous Sesame Street doll with blue eyes.
And after its owner, Mike Bowers, a collector in California, posted an article about agate on Facebook, it went viral, with newspaper articles from Australia to the United States.
Speaking to Life Science, Bowers said, “I had no idea Cookie Monster was so well known and part of the world’s cultural heritage.” He revealed that since then he has received a call from the actor who plays “Cookie Monster” on “Sesame Street”.
The agate arrived in Bowers in November via Brazilian gemologist Lucas Vasari, who obtained it from a collection of garnets at Soledad. Bowers immediately purchased the “Cookie Monster” garnet, but did not publish it on the internet until January 16, because he had the “Covid-19” virus.
Agate occurs in the form of quartz, the crystalline form of silicon dioxide, which grows inside cavities in igneous rocks. Cavities are formed by gas bubbles in hot lava.
Over time, as the lava cools, water saturated with silicon dioxide seeps through the cavities. When water evaporates, it forms colored layers of crystals. Colors are caused by chemical impurities in the silicon dioxide and by the spacing of the crystals.
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Some agates completely fill their volcanic vacuums, but many leave small areas inside, lined with shiny quartz crystals facing inward. In the case of Cookie Monster garnets, these spaces look like a pair of doll eyes and a very smiling mouth.
“It’s a bit rare to find a garnet face shape, but in a lot of cases it’s like looking at clouds. You see a face one way or another,” Bowers said.
Another unique feature of Cookie Monster Garnet, he added, is that the face appears on either side of the cut stone. Usually the spaces are not aligned precisely to create a mirror image.
Bowers said he currently plans to keep the stone. It can end up in a museum or in the hands of a high class collector.
He posted images of the rock to his Facebook account this month and said he has since been offered $ 10,000 by five different buyers.
Source: Science Live
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