A catalog of all minerals on Earth to search for extraterrestrial life

Nature has 'devised' no less than 21 different ways to 'make pyrite over 4,500 million years, while diamonds are the result of nine different combinations.

The ingenious ways in which minerals have been formed tell the story of our planet.

A story that, after 15 years of work, an international team of scientists has deciphered and condensed into the largest catalog of minerals on Earth published to date.

Under the umbrella of the Carnegie Institution for Science, in the USA, they have managed to describe 10,556 minerals, compared to the 5,800 recognized by the International Association of Mineralogy based only on their structure and composition.

, which is why the authors speak of "types of minerals".

"This work fundamentally changes our vision of the diversity of the Earth's minerals," said Robert Hazen, who together with Shaunna Morrison has coordinated the two studies published this Friday in

, and which have had the participation of NASA .

Pyrite forms in 21 different ways ARKENSTONE/ROB LAVINSKY

And it is that in addition to using this tool to reconstruct the history of life on Earth and find new deposits, they believe that it will help to search for extraterrestrial life and discover unknown minerals on other worlds.

According to the authors, this knowledge will allow them to

For example, if Mars contains hydrothermal sulfur deposits, it could have a reserve of certain associated minerals.

'Time Capsules'

In total, they have deciphered 57

used by nature to obtain those 10,500 types of minerals.

"Each mineral specimen has its story, each one tells a story, and each one is a time capsule that reveals Earth's past like nothing else can," Hazen said in a Carnegie Institution news release.

In more than 80% of them, water is one of the ingredients

, which, according to scientists, explains why there is much more variety on Earth than on the Moon, Mercury or even Mars, with a history similar to ours.

Another curious result is that a third of the terrestrial minerals would not have formed without the contribution of biology, both indirectly - creating an oxygen-rich atmosphere that allowed the emergence of 2,000 minerals that would not exist without that oxygen - and directly. -containing remains of bones, shells or microbes-.

Opalized ammonite. CARNEGIE INSTITUTION FOR SCIENCE

Thus, 72 minerals derived directly from guano (accumulation of excrement) and the urine of birds and bats have been counted.

These include spheniscidite, a very rare mineral that exists thanks to penguin urine and is formed on Elephant Island in Antarctica.

59% of the minerals -3,349 types to be exact- have been formed in a single way, while 40% have originated in at least two different ways, in many cases in more than 15 ways.

The absolute record is held, as we said, by pyrite (FeS2),

that has originated in 21 different ways and that is a true example of the versatility of nature: it forms when there are very high temperatures and also low temperatures, with and without water, with the help of microbes but also in really hostile environments in which life can hardly get ahead... Composed of one part of iron and two parts of sulfur, it has emerged both in space -it has reached us through meteorites- and on Earth, in processes that take place in volcanoes , hydrothermal deposits or mines.

Tourmaline. CARNEGIE INSTITUTION FOR SCIENCE

Although the history of the Earth is just over 4.5 billion years old, it is striking that

.

This is because during those initial stages crucial processes began in the modeling of the planet, such as the formation of the oceans, the development of the continental crust and, perhaps, the beginning of early forms of subduction -the processes by which the tectonic plates-, according to scientists.

, with an estimated age of 4.4 billion years.

minerals from space

However, they have also seen that

since it is known that they arrived through meteorites, and in some of them, grains with an estimated age of 7,000 million years have been identified, that is, They had already emerged about 2.5 billion years before our planet.

Calcite. CARNEGIE INSTITUTION FOR SCIENCE

Diamond, one of the most valued minerals, is basically composed of carbon but scientists have documented nine ways in which it has been formed, including by condensation in the atmospheres of very old stars, during the impact of a meteorite and in the bowels of the Earth under conditions of very high pressure and high temperatures.

On the other hand, more than 600 minerals come from human activities, including half a thousand obtained in mines.

For Auhuai Lu, president of the International Association of Mineralogy, this catalog "offers a way to discover possible minerals in nature" but also "may be the key to reconstructing past life and predicting what future life on Earth will be like."

Likewise, he considers that understanding the evolution of minerals allows "a new path when it comes to exploring deep space and looking for extraterrestrial life and in the future habitable planets."

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