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Formula: (Ce,La,Ca)9(Mg,Fe3+)(SiO4)3(SiO3OH)4(OH)3
Nesosilicate (insular SiO4 groups), cerite group
Crystal System: Trigonal
Specific gravity: 4.75 measured, 4.86 calculated
Hardness: 5½
Streak: Greyish white
Colour: Brown, cherry red, grey
Solubility: Gelatinises with acids
Weakly RADIOACTIVE
Environments
Pegmatites
Hydrothermal environments
Minerals associated with cerite-(Ce) include bastnäsite,
allanite, epidote,
monazite-(Ce), törnebohmite,
fluorite, uraninite,
baryte, quartz and
galena
(HOM).
Localities
At the Poudrette quarry, Mont Saint-Hilaire, La Vallée-du-Richelieu RCM, Montérégie, Quebec, Canada,
cerite-(Ce) occurs in a pegmatite
(Dana).
At the Lovozero Massif, Murmansk Oblast, Russia, cerite-(Ce) occurs in
natrolite veins
(Dana).
At the Sangilen Upland, Tuva, Russia, cerite-(Ce) in
natrolite veins
(Dana).
The type locality is the St Görans Mine, Bastnäs Mines, Riddarhyttan, Skinnskatteberg, Västmanland County,
Sweden. At the Bastnäs mines, cerite-(Ce) was found embedded in
bismuthinite, together with
allanite. Other associated minerals include
amphiboles, bastnäsite
and törnebohmite. Cerite-(Ce) may be replaced by
allanite-(Ce), bastnäsite
and more rarely lanthanite-(Ce)
(MinRec 35.3.195).
At the Gölcük Maar Crater, Gölcük District, Isparta Province, Turkey, the mineralogical assemblages of
skarn samples collected from the volcanoclastic products predominantly consist of
clinopyroxene, garnet,
vesuvianite, plagioclase,
wollastonite, esseneite
(or olivine), calcite
and dolomite, with accessory
ferriallanite-(Ce),
phlogopite, amphibole,
quartz, apatite,
spinel, cerite-(Ce) and
monazite-(Ce)
(CM 40.1177-1184).
At the Mountain Pass Mine, Mountain Pass, Mountain Pass District, Clark Mts, San Bernardino county,
California, USA, cerite-(Ce) occurs in rare-earth-bearing hydrothermal
quartz-baryte-carbonatite
veins in shonkinite in an area of metamorphic rocks
(HOM). Associated minerals include bastnäsite,
baryte, quartz,
chalcedony, calcite,
galena and altered
aegirine
(AM 43.460-475).
At the Longs Peak - St Vrain batholith near Jamestown, Jamestown District, Boulder county,
Colorado, USA, centimetre to decimetre sized mineralised pods and veins consist of zoned
mineral assemblages dominated by fluorbritholite-(Ce)
in a core 10 cm thick, with monazite-(Ce),
fluorite and minor quartz,
uraninite and sulphides. The core is surrounded by a
typically millimetre thick rim of allanite-(Ce), with
minor monazite-(Ce) in the inner part of the rim.
Bastnäsite-(Ce),
törnebohmite-(Ce) and
cerite-(Ce) appear in an intermediate zone between core and
rim, often just a few hundreds of microns wide
(R&M 96.3.252-253).
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