Is the idea of ​​turning stone into gold a bit too far-fetched? How about turning cheap gold into precious gold?

Gold is a symbol of wealth. The ancients even fantasized about turning stones into gold. When they realized that this fantasy was unreliable, they still did not give up hope. If stones didn't work, then they would settle for the next best thing, turning base metals into precious metals. So alchemy came into being. In my country, although alchemy pursues a higher level of immortality, Huangbaishu is also an important part of it. Huangbai is the use of color to represent gold and silver. Huangbaishu is to use drugs to make base metals such as copper, lead, and tin look similar to gold and silver. The "gold" produced in this way is called "medicinal gold", which is actually brass, which is a copper-zinc alloy. The drug used is calamine, which can be used for both medicinal and zinc extraction.

Alchemy (Picture from the Internet, please delete if infringed)

The main component of calamine is smithsonite, but not entirely, because it may also contain symbiotic or associated hydrozincite. However, both can produce zinc oxide after calcination, and their efficacy as medicines is the same, so they are not specifically distinguished when used as medicine.

Minerals as medicine - Calamine

In fact, hydrozincite is a naturally formed basic zinc carbonate, which belongs to the basic carbonate minerals. Basic carbonate refers to metal ion carbonates containing hydroxyl groups. When zinc comes into contact with humid air or aqueous solution containing carbon dioxide, a thin film will form on its surface, isolating the inside from the outside world and no longer oxidizing. This protective film is basic zinc carbonate. In the natural environment, smithsonite and other zinc-containing minerals formed in the oxidation zone of lead-zinc ore can form hydrozincite under such conditions, and it has the characteristics of stable properties, insoluble in cold water, low hardness, and foaming in acid.

Hydrozincite specimens in the collection

Therefore, the caves that can form stalactites are the ideal mineralization environment for hydrozincite. The caves are connected to the outside world, the air pressure is the same as the outside world, and the temperature is about the local annual average temperature. In such a stable water environment at normal temperature and pressure (low temperature and low pressure for mineralization), hydrozincite accumulates into layers like stalactites, with the center of the layer thickening and bulging and spreading, thinning, and converging to the periphery, thus continuously increasing. The final shape is also like stalactites, in the shape of stalactites, grapes, kidneys, balls, etc., and it is even difficult to distinguish the real from the fake when placed together with stalactites.

Cave environment (picture from the Internet, please delete if infringed)

This shape also makes hydrozincite have another use besides extracting zinc - ornamental stone, especially the huge, pure white hydrozincite aggregates. Some are like waves crashing on the shore, full of movement; some are like clouds rolling and unrolling, unpredictable; and some are like ice and snow, quiet and beautiful. The beauty of the artistic conception cannot be described in a few words. Here are the beautiful pictures of the exhibits collected by our museum for you to appreciate.

Hydrozincite specimens in the collection