Simply - Stirring Bar?

There is a #mineral iriginite, that was named after... nothing, in fact. The author just liked the sound of the name. P. S. I wasn't able to fine a lot about the author (Epshtein G. Yu), except it was a woman. This surname isn't helping in online search... www.mindat.org/min-2046.html #mineralnames

A question to English native speakers: In here - "Thomas Sterry Hunt" - is Sterry" name or surname? As far as I fount it is rather name in this case, but I want to be sure. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_... #minerals #mineralnames

Xtals tree, 2026 edition. One structure for each user with finalized structure from current year. #crystallography #chemtree #chemchat #chemsky

That is how most of our pet projects with @lfusaro-nmr.bsky.social start. #chemchat

Dr. Anthony Kampf, Curator Emeritus of Mineral Sciences, says his work over the years sometimes seemed like an episode of CSI, conducting “forensic mineralogy”—unravelling mysteries, detecting fakes, and spotting signs of human intervention by following clues: go.nhm.org/forensic-min...

A rare case when I am analyzing non-white powders.

My research involved atropo... what exactly?

Pollen grains have a sort of “exoskeleton” made of sporopollenin, which is one of the most resilient biopolymers known in nature. We use a mixture of concentrated sulfuric acid and acetic anhydride to dissolve organics in the mud and the pollen survives!

Wait, there is a #mineral named* after a cat Rruff? Rruffite: www.mindat.org/min-39845.html *Not directly, the database was named after the cat. #mineralnames

By request of @stripplab.bsky.social : Lecture was on amino acids and had a quick excursion on D-amino acids which are featured in platypus venom, of course. Because why wouldn't platypuses add another layer of weirdness

It is alive! After second attempt - now I know that a dead electrolytic capacitor can eat a part of a printing board. P. S. Another case where crystallography supporting NMR - I used my mounting microscope for soldering this device.

Have you got your #CSDPacked yet? 👀 See your top collaborators, how many space groups you've hit, your heaviest element, and more in your own personalized report for 2025. #Crystallography #Chemistry #CompChemSky

And another (third) mineral named after a plant - Rotemite. www.mindat.org/min-471492.h... #mineralnames #minerals

We will just measure this “simple organic molecule”… - diffuse scattering - pseudo-merohedral twinning - whole structure disorder #crystallography

Sending usual portion of hate to Agilent for killing “their” NMR department and support. And I am even not a NMR guy! You can try to guess a problem with this He level meter. Thankfully, unofficial support is still around and helpful. #NMRchat

What's my #CSDPacked @ccdc.cam.ac.uk? My publishing name is Nikolay Tumanov.

A question to #chemchat #chemsky - can you recommend a _bad_ food supplement supplier? I want to check few particular supplements and I need some unreliable and bad examples (toxic and heavy metal will be a bonus :) ). Local pharmacy was too boring, everything was fine...

Fellow chemists, scientists, and lab rats, Next semester, my Crime Scene Chemistry class is focusing on miscommunication. Do you have any stories about improperly labeled items in the lab that led to confusion or an accident?

I am delighted to share a recent publication I co-authored with Ashok Ajoy's team and Liang Tan's group. We used a simple crystal of pentacene-doped para-terphenyl as a quantum sensor for detecting PT, achieving exceptional sensitivity. www.nature.com/articles/s41...

University got some -80 C fridges as a donation. But “some” I mean 6 tons of fridges.

#CSDPacked this year for many of us will be like this: I mean literally.

Ah, found a third of software #minerals, Rietveldite: www.mindat.org/min-50771.html First one is evident, second is a bit trickier to guess. #crystallography

Happy Advent! !!!🎄✨ Welcome to a new edition of the Research Integrity Advent Calendar. Each day brings a small challenge: spot the problem, detect inconsistencies, and sharpen your skills. Enjoy the season and the daily puzzles! Day 1. papermills.tilda.ws/advent2025

I had to admit that I (only formally a chemist) ones asked proper chemists almost same question: “Do you know how to make <illicit compound> simply from <very common stuff>? Because (looking on results) you did it somehow.”

International researchers in our university are organizing a party inspired by recent Louvre heist. What they most probably did not know that the university had legal problems with gold stuff from Louvre in past… (ok, it was just customs that wanted to charge import tax on research samples). 1/2

🆕 Academic slop reporter! I'm going to start collecting and compiling A.I. slop graphics that have appeared in academic journals, similar to my collection of academic hoaxes. If you stumble across any slop in a journal, tell me about it! docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1F...

New data fields for Cambridge Structural Database (CSD) entries are now available, including: ✔️Wavelength 👍Resolution 🔭Flack parameter ⚛️Data availability indicators Learn more about the new release here🔗 ccdc-info.com/4pgNmeU #CompChemSky

To find the value Z' we applied magic* that gives clear and helpful answer: "Not 1". Which is consistent with values from diffraction: 1.5 or 3. Have fun with structure solution from powder, they say... *¹³C MAS NMR #crystallography #chemchat #NMRchat

Yep, pseudo-orthorhombic cell, exactly what I need from powder diffraction... And no 21 axis in the structure. #crystallography #chemchat

They say that healing crystals do not exist in nature, but just look on names of these #minerals : Pharmacoalumite Pharmacolite Pharmacosiderite Pharmazincite P. S. Do not try to eat them...

Yep, I know exact which pictures you mean. And no idea where to find it now...

I introduce our fresh PhD student to the term “deliquescence”. Blue curve - fast PXRD measurement of a sample; black curve - longer measurement of “Powder” XRD. Said “powder” after measurement. Ok, it means that next point of our program is “how to do PXRD of an air-sensitive sample” #chemchat

Ah, and if you need a DYI version of it, ask @vsaggiomo.bsky.social, @drheaddamage.bsky.social and co. www.beilstein-journals.org/bjnano/artic...

In the spirit of #ChemChat, here is one of my favourite bits of physical chemistry out in the real world: the 4th century Roman Lycurgus Cup. Green in reflection, red in transmission, due to gold/silver nanoparticles in the glass, I finally got to see it for real a few weeks ago. Beautiful.

I've started research on historic (preWW2) women who worked on volcanology/magmatic rocks. This includes anyone who was traveling to and writing about/observing/drawing/engaging with the landscape in myriad ways. I'm building a list for further investigation. Will share soon! Any tip offs welcome!

Hungarian mineralogist Andor von Semsey (1833–1923) has three minerals named after him. One, Semseyite, named after his surname and _two_ after his first name: Quatrandorite and Senandorite. #mineralnames #mineral

#Australia, I have so many questions: Why would you call something in Australia as Polar Bear peninsula? There is (almost) no polar bears in Australia. It is even not a proper peninsula for most of the year - you know, lack of water. And last but not least, it is clearly a meerkat.

It is year 2025 and still my insurance website is not using parsing for input fields, like removing spaces from account number....

I discovered recently that among various employee's advantages from our university, we have discount in a vinery and in a escargotière a.k.a. snail farm. Also, you can take your own tractor and a chainsaw and collect firewood in the university's forest.

After a long series of events I need a new wok pan. So, a question to #ChemistsWhoCook and #chemchat - do you have a recommendation for a pan with non-stick coating, but without PFAS? The one that is really non-stick and holds reasonable time?

I've got a post-doctoral research position available at Curtin University (Western Australia) starting 2026. The project involves computational prediction of crystal structures, their growth, and their properties for organic minerals on Titan (moon of Saturn). staff.curtin.edu.au/job-vacancie...

Nature, what the… ? HCl2- anion from the same group of suspects. #crystallography #chemsky #chemchat

Mineral on-line database ATHENA - made ones in 1994, works for >30 years. Take this Google and co! athena.unige.ch/athena/

⏰ It’s almost time! Join us tomorrow for the first STOE User Talk of the season: 🧪 pTB in NoSpherA2 – Enabling Non-Spherical Refinements within Seconds 👨🔬 Ben Ebel, RWTH Aachen 📅 November 13, 15:00 CET 🔗 Register now — don’t miss it: stoe.clickmeeting.com/ebel/register

I saw when suppliers screwed up a very reactive air sensitive chemicals or mistaken isomers of a weird natural macrocycle, that you may expect. But to screw up KCl, that is an achievement! I am pretty sure that KCl should not have pH 10… #chemsky #chemchat

Local climbing gym is equipped with a doghouse. Maybe it was something else at the beginning, but now it is definitely the doghouse.

I was almost triggered by my own post, see the picture. It is the aluminum analogue, not Artificial Idiot analogue...

Pääkkönenite - probably the most umlaut-rich #mineral. www.mindat.org/min-3226.html

Just in case if you were wondering about longest iodide in the world, I have answer for you: hexadecaiodide, I₁₆⁴⁻. pubs.rsc.org/en/content/a... www.ccdc.cam.ac.uk/structures/S... #chemsky #chemchat