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

Natural brown topaz

Brown topaz, GRR 515 from Topaz Mountain, Utah. Natural color. plotted as 7.0 mm thick. Data files: Alpha. Beta.

Naturally blue topaz

naturally blue topaz GIA 2828 from Saint Anns Mine, Karoi District, Zimbabwe, Plotted as 10 mm thick. Data Files: Alpha; Beta; Gamma.
naturally blue topaz GRR 1894 from Volodarsk Volynskii, Ukraine, Plotted as 10 mm thick.

Irradiated blue topaz

blue, neutron-irradiated topaz GRR 1632 from Nigeria. Plotted as 3.0 mm thick. This is typical of some of the blue topaz now on the market. Data Files: Alpha; Beta: Gamma
blue, electron-irradiated topaz GRR 10 plotted as 10 mm thick. Data Files: Alpha; Beta; Gamma
blue, electron-irradiated topaz Darker region in sample GRR 825 from Brazil. Plotted as 5.0 mm. Data files Alpha; Beta
blue, electron-irradiated topaz Lighter, purer gblue region in sample GRR 825 from Brazil. Plotted as 5.0 mm. Data files Alpha; Beta

Chromium-containing pink topaz

pink topaz GRR 1393 from Katlang, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Province, 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.

Back to the list of minerals

Back to the Mineral Spectroscopy home page