Topaz spectra

Topaz Visible Spectra (350 - 1250 nm)

Topaz can be naturally blue, pink, and various shades of brown or amber. Most blue topaz on the market has been artifically colored with irradiation. The pink color comes from Cr³⁺ and the amber and brown colors come from radiation damage. You can view a suite of crystals ranging from the natural colorless, irradiated brown, and irradiated plus heat-treated blue.

Image of the topaz absorption spectrum

Naturally blue topaz

naturally blue topaz from Saint Anne, Rhodesia, Plotted as 10 mm thick.
naturally blue topaz from Volodarsk Volynskii, Ukraine, Plotted as 10 mm thick.

Irradiated blue topaz

blue, neutron-irradiated topaz from Nigeria. Plotted as 3.0 mm thick. This is typical of some of the blue topaz now on the market.

Chromium-containing pink topaz

pink topaz from Katling, Pakistan, 4.41 mm thick.
violet topaz, 300 - 2200 nm; expanded visible region 300 - 900 nm from Bobrovka, Ural Mountains, Russia, 3.0 mm thick, with Cr₂O₃=0.36, FeO=0.03, MnO=0.02. Contributed data files from MN Taran, Kiev, Ukraine: alpha 10 K; beta 11 K; gamma 11 K.

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