zircon
a common mineral, zirconium silicate, ZrSiO4, occurring in small tetragonal crystals or grains of various colors, usually opaque: used as a refractory when opaque and as a gem when transparent.
Origin of zircon
1Words Nearby zircon
Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2024
How to use zircon in a sentence
The new research focused on tiny traces of several elements in the old zircons.
Tiny gemstones show when Earth’s crust first started moving | Nikk Ogasa | June 13, 2022 | Science News For StudentsArmstrong plans to continue studying zircons, in the hopes of finding more ways to exploit them for details about ancient quakes.
Ancient zircons offer insights into earthquakes of the past | Nikk Ogasa | June 7, 2022 | Science NewsMost of the world’s Hadean zircons have been found in a just a dozen sites, and most of those are from a site in Australia.
For the zircons, the team measured the decay of uranium to lead, and in the sand, the researchers compared the abundances of radioactive argon isotopes with stable ones.
The mysterious Hiawatha crater in Greenland is 58 million years old | Carolyn Gramling | March 9, 2022 | Science NewsThe study identified grains of the mineral zircon in a Martian meteorite that appeared to be “shocked” by high pressures, indicating large impacts on the Martian surface.
Early Mars was a long-lasting hell, meteorite study suggests | Leto Sapunar | February 4, 2022 | Popular-Science
In mineralogy, the term is applied to crystallised yellow or brown zircon.
zircon is also the source of oxide of zirconium used in making mantles for certain incandescent lights.
Geology | William J. MillerOther minerals, except apatite, zircon and magnetite, are typically absent.
Jargon or zircon is a stone having a superficial resemblance to a diamond.
A Description of the Coasts of East Africa and Malabar | Duarte Barbosazircon is itself a species of mineral and is a silicate of zirconium.
A Text-Book of Precious Stones for Jewelers and the Gem-Loving Public | Frank Bertram Wade
British Dictionary definitions for zircon
/ (ˈzɜːkɒn) /
a reddish-brown, grey, green, blue, or colourless hard mineral consisting of zirconium silicate in tetragonal crystalline form with hafnium and some rare earths as impurities. It occurs principally in igneous rocks and is an important source of zirconium, zirconia, and hafnia: it is used as a gemstone and a refractory. Formula: ZrSiO 4
Origin of zircon
1Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012
Scientific definitions for zircon
[ zûr′kŏn′ ]
A brown, reddish to bluish, gray, green, or colorless tetragonal mineral that occurs in igneous, metamorphic, and sedimentary rocks, and especially in sand. The colorless varieties are valued as gems. Chemical formula: ZrSiO4.
The American Heritage® Science Dictionary Copyright © 2011. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.
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