Iceland spar. As its name suggests it was originally discovered - TopicsExpress



          

Iceland spar. As its name suggests it was originally discovered in Iceland. Today most Iceland spar comes from mines in Mexico and the USA. Iceland spar is a transparent form of calcium with unusual properties, among them the ability to polarize light. It is used for making lenses and other parts of precision optical instruments (microscopes) etc. * Many people have speculated that Iceland spar was the original sunstone used in navigation by the Vikings. It has recently been shown that Iceland spar can be used to locate the position of the sun in the sky, even on overcast days. * Although transparent, like glass, it does something that glass does not- it doubles up images, presenting two views of anything below to the observer, this strange phenomenon is known as: birefringence.
Posted on: Mon, 25 Aug 2014 10:25:10 +0000

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