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What gold looks like in nature. The origin of gold in the universe and on earth What gold was formed from

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How is gold formed? There are several options for the formation of precious metals. Scientists still find it difficult to answer this question unambiguously. But there are several hypotheses that suggest how and where it came from on our planet.

Where did it come from?

Where does gold come from and where is it born? There are two main versions that will help you understand the problem.

The first version of cosmic origin.
Second version: metal was originally on the planet.

Gold in the bowels of the Earth

Scientists suggest that a long time ago several meteorites fell on planet Earth. They included gold as an element. As the years passed, the meteorites were gradually destroyed by water, air and wind. The process was also accelerated by microorganisms. As a result, the metal appeared not only in the bowels of the earth, but also in water.

The second version is more plausible, and scientists prefer it. It is believed that the element was part of the primary matter from which all living and nonliving things on our planet emerged.

Gold is found everywhere in nature; it is part of living organisms, found in plants, animals and even inside humans. But the concentration of this metal is so low that it is extremely difficult to detect.

It is much easier to find precious metal in water or rock. The search for such deposits has worried humanity for many years. After all, by opening a deposit, it was possible to solve all the problems at once; the search forced people to explore unknown territories and discover new lands. Humanity has experienced several gold rushes, which mainly occurred in the 19th century.

But the passion for gold has not passed, despite the fact that most of the reserves of this element have already been exhausted, people continue to search and find new deposits.

Types of deposits

There are two main types of deposits in nature:

primary, that is, indigenous;
secondary, that is, alluvial.

Indigenous ones are larger; they are found in the bowels of the Earth mixed with other elements. Scientists suggest that while in magma, gold came out in small quantities during volcanic activity. Then it solidified, and thus the formation of metal deposits occurred. Gold is often found as an alloy with other elements, in most cases with silver, copper, nickel, ore and platinum. When mining ore, workers can discover not only the necessary material, but also precious metal.

If a deposit of silver or copper is discovered, the amount of gold (if it is discovered at all) is meager. But the opposite situation is observed, if a deposit has been discovered, such “finds” are rare, but in the deposits there will be enough of both one and the other metal.

Placer deposits are smaller and are found in estuaries or on river banks. This happens because the breed is influenced by external factors. Water destroys it, washing away the precious metal. Rock particles are light and therefore they float further, but gold is heavy and dense. It settles at the bottom of the river or in depressions, where people discover it.

Both primary and placer deposits can be classified by volume:

unique indigenous (according to forecasts, more than one thousand tons);
unique alluvial (about or more than 50 tons);
very large indigenous ones (from 100 to one thousand tons);
very large placers (from five to 45 tons);
large indigenous ones (from 100 to 400 tons);
large placers (from one to five tons).

Gold can form under layers of waste rock, and this process requires specific conditions: temperature and pressure. If conditions are assessed as favorable, then the resulting piece of metal (even a small grain) can turn into a nugget of impressive size.

Nuggets and properties of gold

Raw gold in the form of a piece measuring 15 g or more is usually called a nugget. They are rare in nature; finding a nugget is a great success. The oldest nugget was discovered back in the 11th century AD. Its weight was, according to the description, 2.5 tons; naturally, it did not survive to this day. It is impossible to find a similar size today, but history knows several records that are very impressive:

The “Holtermann Plate” is a nugget that was found in Australia; its weight was 100 kg.
The “Japanese” from the island of Hokkaido weighed 71 kg.
The “Big Triangle”, which was found in the Urals, weighed only 36 kg.
The “Golden Giant” from Magadan could not boast of such dimensions, its weight is only 14 kg.

Finding a nugget is difficult; in most cases, the metal is found together with other elements, for this reason the color of the gold may surprise the new owner. And only a specialist can determine the value of a find.

Two sides of one nugget

It is noteworthy that the precious metal may not have a characteristic luster and color, for this reason it is difficult to identify on the spot. The following knowledge about the precious metal will help determine what exactly the seeker is holding in his hands:

has low resistance to electric current;
tolerates temperature well and conducts heat (high thermal conductivity);
gold is dense and therefore weighs a lot.

The element most often found is green in color and shade; it may have a characteristic shine, by which it is easy to identify. But there may be no shine, it all depends on what metals are included in the alloy besides gold.

It is also worth noting one more quality that is characteristic of all metals of noble origin - inertia. Gold is not afraid of acids and other chemicals. If you immerse it in warm aqua regia, then nothing will happen to the metal. Chemists call “royal vodka” a mixture of two acids, sulfuric and nitric. But even immersion in hydrochloric acid will not change the gold and will not affect its properties. If there are no reagents, then you should contact specialists who will help you figure it out.

Gold is a metal that can be found anywhere; Thus, scientists recently discovered this element in the waters of the World Ocean. Naturally, the content of precious metal in water is negligible. Perhaps the time is not far off when they will begin to extract gold not by mining, but will learn to extract it from sea water. At the moment, this method of extracting precious metals is considered unpromising.

December 15th, 2013

Gold... Yellow metal, a simple chemical element with atomic number 79. The object of desire of people at all times, a measure of value, a symbol of wealth and power. Bloody metal, spawn of the devil. How many human lives were destroyed for the sake of possessing this metal!? And how many more will be destroyed?

Unlike iron or, for example, aluminum, there is very little gold on Earth. Throughout its history, humanity has mined as much gold as it mines iron in one day. But where did this metal come from on Earth?

It is believed that the solar system was formed from the remnants of a supernova that exploded in ancient times. In the depths of that ancient star, a synthesis of chemical elements heavier than hydrogen and helium took place. But elements heavier than iron cannot be synthesized in the depths of stars, and therefore gold could not be formed as a result of thermonuclear reactions in stars. So, where did this metal even come from in the Universe?

It looks like astronomers can now answer this question. Gold cannot be born in the depths of stars. But it can be formed as a result of grandiose cosmic disasters, which scientists casually call gamma-ray bursts (GBs).

Astronomers closely observed one of these gamma-ray bursts. Observational data provide quite serious reasons to believe that this powerful burst of gamma radiation was produced by the collision of two neutron stars - the dead cores of stars that died in a supernova explosion. In addition, the unique glow that persisted at the site of the GW for several days indicates that a significant amount of heavy elements, including gold, was formed during this catastrophe.

“We estimate that the amount of gold produced and ejected into space during the merger of two neutron stars could be more than 10 lunar masses,” said study lead author Edo Berger of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics (CfA) during a CfA press conference. in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

A gamma ray burst (GRB) is a burst of gamma rays from an extremely energetic explosion. Most GWs are found in very distant regions of the Universe. Berger and his colleagues studied the object GRB 130603B, located at a distance of 3.9 billion light years. This is one of the closest GWs seen to date.

There are two types of GWs - long and short, depending on how long the burst of gamma rays lasts. The duration of the GRB 130603B flare, recorded by NASA's Swift satellite, was less than two-tenths of a second.

Although the gamma-ray emission itself disappeared quickly, GRB 130603B continued to shine in infrared rays. The brightness and behavior of this light did not correspond to the typical afterglow that occurs when bombarded by accelerated particles of surrounding matter. GRB 130603B's glow behaved as if it came from decaying radioactive elements. Neutron-rich material ejected from neutron star collisions can become heavy radioactive elements. The radioactive decay of such elements produces infrared radiation characteristic of GRB 130603B. This is exactly what astronomers observed.

According to the group's calculations, the explosion ejected substances with a mass of about one hundredth of the Sun. And part of this substance was gold. Having roughly estimated the amount of gold formed during this GRB, and the number of such explosions that occurred throughout the history of the Universe, astronomers came to the assumption that all the gold in the Universe, including on Earth, may have been formed during such gamma-ray bursts .

Here is another interesting, but terribly controversial version:

As the Earth formed, molten iron flowed down to its center to make up its core, taking with it most of the planet's precious metals, such as gold and platinum. In general, there are enough precious metals in the core to cover the entire surface of the Earth with a four-meter thick layer.

The movement of gold into the core would deprive the outer part of the Earth of this treasure. However, the abundance of noble metals in the Earth’s silicate mantle exceeds calculated values by tens and thousands of times. The idea has already been discussed that this superabundance has been caused by a catastrophic meteor shower that overtook the Earth after the formation of its core. The entire mass of meteorite gold, thus, entered the mantle separately and did not disappear deep inside.

To test this theory, Dr Matthias Willbold and Professor Tim Elliott from the Bristol School of Geosciences Isotope Group analyzed rocks collected in Greenland by Oxford University Professor Stephen Moorbutt, which date back around 4 billion years. These ancient rocks provide a unique picture of the composition of our planet shortly after the formation of the core, but before the supposed meteorite bombardment.

Then scientists began to study the content of tungsten-182 in meteorites, which are called chondrites - this is one of the main building materials of the solid part of the Solar system. On Earth, unstable hafnium-182 decays to form tungsten-182. But in space, due to cosmic rays, this process does not occur. As a result, it became clear that ancient rock samples contain 13% more tungsten-182 compared to younger rocks. This gives geologists reason to claim that when the Earth already had a solid crust, about 1 million trillion (10 to the 18th power) tons of asteroid and meteorite material fell on it, which had a lower content of tungsten-182, but much more than in the earth's crust, the content of heavy elements, in particular gold.

Being a very rare element (there is only about 0.1 milligram of tungsten per kilogram of rock), like gold and other precious metals, it should have entered the core at the time of its formation. Like most other elements, tungsten is divided into several isotopes—atoms with similar chemical properties but slightly different masses. Based on isotopes, one can confidently judge the origin of a substance, and the mixing of meteorites with the Earth should have left characteristic traces in the composition of its tungsten isotopes.

Dr. Willbold noticed a 15 ppm reduction in the amount of the tungsten-182 isotope in the modern rock compared to the Greenland rock.

This small but significant change fits perfectly with what was sought to be proven - that the excess of available gold on Earth was a positive side effect of meteorite bombardment.

Dr Willbold said: “Extracting tungsten from stone samples and analyzing its isotopic composition with the required precision was extremely challenging given the small amount of tungsten present in the stones. In fact, we became the first laboratory in the world to successfully perform measurements of this level.”

Falling meteorites mixed with the earth's mantle during giant convection processes. The maximum task for the future is to find out the duration of this mixing. Subsequently, geological processes formed the continents and led to the concentration of precious metals (as well as tungsten) in the ore deposits that are mined today.

Dr. Willbold continues: “Our work shows that most of the precious metals on which our economy and many key industrial processes are based were brought to our planet by a fluke when the Earth was hit by some 20 quintillion tons of asteroid material.”

Thus, we owe our gold reserves to a real flow of valuable elements that ended up on the surface of the planet thanks to a massive asteroid “bombardment”. Then, during the development of the Earth over the past billions of years, gold entered the rock cycle, appearing on its surface and again hiding in the depths of the upper mantle.

But now his path to the core is closed, and a large amount of this gold is simply doomed to end up in our hands.

Neutron star merger

And another opinion from another scientist:

The origin of gold remained unclear because, unlike lighter elements such as carbon or iron, it cannot be formed directly inside a star, admitted one of the researchers at the center, Edo Berger.

The scientist came to this conclusion by observing gamma-ray bursts - large-scale cosmic emissions of radioactive energy caused by the collision of two neutron stars. The gamma-ray burst was spotted by NASA's Swift spacecraft and lasted just two-tenths of a second. And after the explosion there was a glow that gradually disappeared. The glow from the collision of such celestial bodies indicates the release of a large amount of heavy elements, experts say. And evidence that heavy elements were formed after the explosion can be considered infrared light in their spectrum.

The fact is that neutron-rich substances ejected during the collapse of neutron stars can generate elements that undergo radioactive decay, while emitting a glow primarily in the infrared range, Berger explained. “And we believe that a gamma-ray burst ejects about one hundredth of the solar mass of material, including gold. Moreover, the amount of gold produced and ejected during the merger of two neutron stars can be comparable to the mass of 10 Moons. And the cost of such an amount of precious metal would be equal to 10 octillions of dollars - that’s 100 trillion squared.

For reference, an octillion is a million septillion, or a million to the seventh power; a number equal to 1042, written in decimal as a one followed by 42 zeros.

Also today, scientists have established the fact that almost all gold (and other heavy elements) on Earth are of cosmic origin. Gold, it turns out, came to Earth as a result of an asteroid bombardment that occurred in ancient times after the crust of our planet solidified.

Almost all heavy metals “sank” into the Earth’s mantle at the very early stage of the formation of our planet; it was they who formed the solid metal core in the center of the Earth.

Alchemists of the 20th century

Back in 1940, American physicists A. Sherr and K. T. Bainbridge from Harvard University began irradiating elements adjacent to gold - mercury and platinum - with neutrons. And quite expectedly, having irradiated mercury, they obtained isotopes of gold with mass numbers of 198, 199 and 200. Their difference from natural Au-197 is that the isotopes are unstable and, emitting beta rays, in a maximum of a few days again turn into mercury with mass numbers 198,199 and 200.

But it was still great: for the first time, a person was able to independently create the necessary elements. It soon became clear how it was possible to obtain real, stable gold-197. This can be done using only the isotope mercury-196. This isotope is quite rare - its content in ordinary mercury with a mass number of 200 is about 0.15%. It must be bombarded with neutrons in order to obtain the unstable mercury-197, which, having captured an electron, will turn into stable gold.

However, calculations have shown that if you take 50 kg of natural mercury, it will contain only 74 grams of mercury-196. For transmutation into gold, the reactor can produce a neutron flux of 10 to the 15th power of neutrons per square meter. cm per second. Considering that 74 g of mercury-196 contains about 2.7 to 10 to the 23rd power of atoms, it would take four and a half years for the complete transmutation of mercury into gold. This synthetic gold is infinitely more expensive than gold from the earth. But this meant that the formation of gold in space also required gigantic neutron fluxes. And the explosion of two neutron stars explained everything.

And more details about gold:

German scientists have calculated that in order for the volume of precious metals present today to be brought to Earth, only 160 metal asteroids, each about 20 km in diameter, were needed. Experts note that geological analysis of various noble metals shows that they all appeared on our planet at approximately the same time, but on the Earth itself there were and are not conditions for their natural origin. This is what prompted experts to come up with a cosmic theory of the appearance of noble metals on the planet.

The word "gold", according to linguists, comes from the Indo-European term "yellow" as a reflection of the most noticeable characteristic of this metal. This fact is confirmed by the fact that the pronunciation of the word “gold” is similar in different languages, for example Gold (in English), Gold (in German), Guld (in Danish), Gulden (in Dutch), Gull ( in Norwegian), Kulta (in Finnish).

Gold in the bowels of the earth

Our planet's core contains 5 times more gold than all other mineable rocks combined. If all the gold in the Earth's core spilled onto the surface, it would cover the entire planet with a layer half a meter thick. Interestingly, about 0.02 milligrams of gold is dissolved in every liter of water in all rivers, seas and oceans.

It was determined that during the entire period of mining of the precious metal, about 145 thousand tons were extracted from the subsoil (according to other sources - about 200 thousand tons). Gold production has been increasing year by year, but most of the growth occurred in the late 1970s.

The purity of gold is determined in various ways. Carat (spelled "Karat" in the US and Germany) was originally a unit of mass based on the seeds of the carob tree (similar to the word "karat"), used by ancient traders in the Middle East. Carat today is primarily used to measure the weight of gemstones (1 carat = 0.2 grams). The purity of gold can also be measured in karats. This tradition dates back to ancient times, when the karat in the Middle East became a measure of the purity of gold alloys. The British gold carat is a non-metric unit of measurement of the gold content in alloys, equal to 1/24 of the weight of the alloy. Pure gold corresponds to 24 carats. The purity of gold today is also measured by the concept of chemical purity, that is, thousandths of pure metal in the mass of the alloy. So, 18 carats is 18/24 and, in terms of thousandths, corresponds to the 750th sample.

Gold mining

As a result of natural concentration, only about 0.1% of all gold contained in the earth's crust is available, at least in theory, for mining, but due to the fact that gold occurs in its native form, shines brightly and is easily visible, it became the first metal whom the person met. But natural nuggets are rare, so the most ancient method of extracting rare metals, based on the high density of gold, is panning gold-bearing sands. “The extraction of washing gold requires only mechanical means, and therefore it is no wonder that gold was known even to savages in the most ancient historical times” (D.I. Mendeleev).

But there were almost no rich gold placers left, and already at the beginning of the 20th century, 90% of all gold was mined from ores. Nowadays, many placer gold mines are almost exhausted, so the mining is mainly for ore gold, the extraction of which is largely mechanized, but production remains difficult, since it is often located deep underground. In recent decades, the share of more profitable open-pit mining has steadily increased. It is economically profitable to develop a deposit if a ton of ore contains only 2-3 g of gold, and if the content is more than 10 g/t, it is considered rich. It is significant that the costs of searching and exploring new gold deposits range from 50 to 80% of all geological exploration costs.

Now the largest supplier of gold to the world market is South Africa, where mines have already reached a depth of 4 kilometers. South Africa is home to the world's largest mine, the Vaal Riefs mine in Klexdorp. South Africa is the only country where gold is the main product of production. There it is mined in 36 large mines, which employ hundreds of thousands of people.

In Russia, gold is mined from ore and placer deposits. Researchers have different opinions about the beginning of its extraction. Apparently, the first domestic gold was mined in 1704 from Nerchinsk ores along with silver. In subsequent decades, at the Moscow Mint, gold was isolated from silver, which contained some gold as an impurity (about 0.4%). So, in 1743-1744. “from gold found in silver smelted at the Nerchinsk factories,” 2820 chervonets with the image of Elizabeth Petrovna were made.

The first gold placer in Russia was discovered in the spring of 1724 by the peasant Erofey Markov in the Yekaterinburg region. Its operation began only in 1748. Mining of Ural gold slowly but steadily expanded. At the beginning of the 19th century, new gold deposits were discovered in Siberia. The discovery (in the 1840s) of the Yenisei deposit brought Russia to first place in the world in gold mining, but even before that, local Evenki hunters made bullets for hunting from gold nuggets. At the end of the 19th century, Russia produced about 40 tons of gold per year, of which 93% was alluvial gold. In total, according to official data, 2,754 tons of gold were mined in Russia before 1917, but according to experts, about 3,000 tons, with the maximum occurring in 1913 (49 tons), when the gold reserves reached 1,684 tons.

With the discovery of rich gold-bearing areas in the USA (California, 1848; Colorado, 1858; Nevada, 1859), Australia (1851), South Africa (1884), Russia lost its primacy in gold mining, despite the fact that New fields were put into operation, mainly in Eastern Siberia.
Gold mining in Russia was carried out in a semi-artisanal manner, mainly alluvial deposits were developed. Over half of the gold mines were in the hands of foreign monopolies. Currently, the share of production from placers is gradually decreasing, amounting to slightly more than 50 tons by 2007. Less than 100 tons are mined from ore deposits. Final processing of gold is carried out at refineries, the leading of which is the Krasnoyarsk Non-Ferrous Metals Plant. It accounts for refining (removing impurities, obtaining 99.99% pure metal) about 50% of the gold mined and most of the platinum and palladium mined in Russia.

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Gold is found in minute amounts in almost all rocks that make up the earth's crust. It would seem that humanity should literally go crazy and try to extract this metal by any means. But, as it turned out, this is very expensive, and the costs of searching for it and extracting it from the rock will not be compensated by the amount of yellow substance obtained. To be convincing, we present the following fact: in one ton of rock you can find only 5-6 grams of the precious substance. The only good news is that in different types of ore its concentration may not be the same.

Often the precious metal is found precisely in quartz veins, where industrial deposits have been located for a long time. But even there, the amount of gold mined is much less than other useful metals located in the same place. Therefore, gold mining is considered a very labor-intensive process, which in complexity is second only to the extraction of expensive and rare platinum from ore.

Today there is a theory according to which there is several hundred times more gold in the earth's core. This is explained by the fact that iron-containing meteorites falling to the ground contain this metal in an amount equal to 5-6 grams per ton. Since the Earth’s core is also iron-containing, it is quite reasonable to assume that there are gold reserves there too.

Precious seas

An interesting fact is that this metal can be found not only in rock, but also in sea and ocean water. Moreover, in different seas and oceans its content is completely different, and the highest concentration is observed in coastal zones and areas with a hot climate. Most of the yellow substance is in the World Ocean, followed by the Dead Sea. For reference, one ton of water in this sea contains 50 mg of this precious metal. By the way, man has already attempted to organize gold mining in the Dead Sea, but failed.

At the level of development of modern technologies, it is quite possible to extract gold from sea water, but doing so is not at all profitable. The fact is that a substance found in nature can be considered a mineral only if its concentration in one place is higher than the clarke value. But how much higher is a question of technology and the properties of the substance itself. At the moment, the level of gold content in sea water does not allow us to hope for obtaining millions of tons of the precious metal. But this is all a matter of time, since technology does not stand in one place.

Nature is designed in such a way that gold is found not only in water, but also in bottom silt. This fact was established by studying the bottom silt of the Red Sea. It turned out that it contains not only the precious metal itself, but also other useful and valuable minerals. Again, their concentration is negligibly small in order to organize large-scale gold mining. Therefore, scientists are looking for a way to process bottom silt, since it is much easier to get to than the earth’s core, for example.

Metal is brought to the sea by rivers, which wash away the rock along their route. Incredibly, the Amur alone brings more than 8 tons of precious metal per year to the Gulf of Tatar! Meteorites should not be overlooked, since they are dispersed into the earth's atmosphere annually in the amount of 3.5 tons, carrying with them 18 kg. gold, a large share of which comes from the World Ocean. But the active volcano Etna, which is located in Sicily, saturates the atmosphere with 2.5 kilograms of gold with each daily ash emission.

It's everywhere!

In fact, this substance is found not only in stone, sea or sand, but also in groundwater, animal bodies and even plants.

The French chemist Bertholet was the first to discover gold particles in the ashes of plants, after which he began to closely study this natural feature. It turns out that trees and bushes accumulate the precious substance in different ways. So, for example, from a ton of birch you can extract 0.5 mg. gold, while from a similar volume of spruce it was already 1.27 mg. The best “batteries” are considered to be corn and horsetail. And if gold is found in the ashes of plants, this can be considered a sign of its deposit.

If we explain the appearance of metal in plants quite simply, then the question of how it appears in the body of an animal remains open. For example, researchers at one of the British nature reserves discovered gold in the fur of deer. It is noteworthy that there is no trace of gold in the land and water located in the protected area.

Physical parameters and types of deposits

Gold is a very heavy metal, with a specific gravity of 19.3. It is unusually malleable and soft, although it looks very presentable, and therefore cannot be used in its original form. In nature there is only one type of gold isotope, the mass number of which is 197. The native metal that you see in the photo undergoes complex processing - refining, after which a chemically pure precious substance is obtained.

There is a distinction between placer and ore gold. The first option is found in quartz rocks or sulfide ores. But placers are a product of the destruction of primary deposits that accumulated in river valleys.

Let's find out...

First, interesting facts about gold

1. Translated from Proto-Indo-European roots, the term "gold" meant "yellow", "green" or perhaps "bright".

2. Gold is a rare metal. Every hour more steel is cast in the world than gold has been mined in the entire history of mankind.

3. On Earth, there are gold deposits on all continents.

4. The melting point of gold is 1064.43 degrees Celsius. This metal conducts heat and electricity perfectly and never rusts.

5. Gold is one of the most valuable metals. The high cost of gold has become a boon for the active development of mines in different parts of the world. However, it is believed that 80% of the total reserves of the precious metal are still located in the bowels of the Earth.

6. 75 percent of the total weight of gold in circulation today was mined after 1910.

7. Medical research in the early 20th century showed that gold was an effective treatment for rheumatoid arthritis.

8. Gold is a very flexible metal. It can be used to make sewing threads. One ounce of gold (28.35 grams) can be stretched over 80 kilometers.

9. Even though gold is a metal, it is edible. In some Asian countries it was added to fruits, jelly desserts, coffee and tea. Since the 1500s, gold leaf has been added to spirits bottles (eg Goldschlager, Danziger Goldwasser). Some Indian tribes believed that eating gold gave the ability to levitate.

10. The weight of one of the largest gold nuggets was 72 kg, its dimensions were 31x63.5 cm. The “treasure” was discovered by John and Richard Deason in Australia on February 5, 1869. The nugget was given the name “Hello, Stranger.” It is noteworthy that the golden “stone” was located at a depth of five centimeters from the surface of the earth.

11. During the economic crisis in March 2008, the price of gold skyrocketed and exceeded $1,000 per ounce (28.35 grams). This was the only such case in history.

12. During periods of economic downturn, investors tend to move their assets into gold and silver. Thus, according to a report by the World Gold Council, in the second half of 2008, the demand for investing in precious metals increased sharply.

13. The Dow/Gold ratio, which shows how much gold is required to purchase one share of Dow stock, is an excellent “reflector” of the state of the global economy. Thus, at the beginning of 2009, the Dow/Gold index fell to the same levels that were recorded in the 1930s and 1980s.

14. Gold is a chemically inert substance, so it never rusts or causes skin irritation. If a piece of gold jewelry causes an allergic reaction, it means that another metal has been added to the alloy.

15. One cubic foot of gold (about 27 cm3) weighs half a ton. The largest gold bar weighs 200 kg (440 lb).

16. In 2005, Rick Munarriz asked what was more profitable for investment: buying gold or Google shares. It turned out that both “products” are equivalent in the stock market. By the end of 2008, Google finished at $307.65, while gold soared in price to $866 an ounce.

17. The medals for the Olympic champions were cast entirely from gold. In modern medals, only the “outer shell” is covered with gold. This requires 6 grams of precious metal.

18. The Incas called gold “Tears of the Sun.” It was believed that this metal was a gift to people from the Sun God. At that time, gold jewelry had purely aesthetic and religious significance; they had no financial power.

19. Around 1200 BC, the ancient Egyptians sifted gold dust from sea sand using unshorn sheepskin. It was this craft that most likely became the source of the legend about the “Golden Fleece”.

20. In ancient Egypt, gold was considered the skin/flesh of the Gods. In particular, the Sun God Ra. For this reason, the precious metal was only available to the pharaohs, their family members and priests. The chambers in which the king’s sarcophagus was located were called the “house of gold.”

21. In ancient times, Nubia was considered the largest gold miner, as evidenced by data from the Turin papyrus. While slaves endured terrible suffering, mining gold nuggets and sifting gold dust from ordinary dirt, Egyptian jewelers, who made jewelry for the nobility, enjoyed a very high, almost sacred position in society.

22. Although the ancient Hebrews had enough gold to create the golden calf, the story of dancing around it while Moses spoke to God on Mount Sinai is most likely a fiction. Scientists argue that gold in those days was not yet connected with money in any way, and it could not have occurred to the Jews to bribe the gods with golden calves.

23. Gold is mentioned at least 400 times in the Bible. Among other things, there is an instruction from God to cover the furniture in the tabernacle with “pure gold.” This metal is also mentioned as one of the gifts of the Magi.

24. The Greeks believed that gold was a dense combination of water and sunlight.

25. In 560 BC. The Lydians issued the world's first gold coin. True, it was not made of pure gold, but of electrum - an alloy of gold and silver. Herodotus criticized the materialism of the Lydians, who were also the first to open retail stores. Around the world, the use of gold coins began after the lands of the Lydians were captured by the Persians.

26. Before gold coins came into use, goods were paid for with plant products and various types of livestock (most often cattle). Construction work in ancient times was carried out by slaves, and there was no need to pay them with money.

27. The chemical element "AU" from the Latin Aurum means "shining light."

28. When the cry of a goose warned the Romans about the intention of the Gauls to attack the temple in which all their treasures were kept, the inhabitants of Rome, as a sign of gratitude to the goddess of Warning (Moneta), built a sanctuary. The connection between saved savings and Moneta was adopted in English by linking the words “money” and “mint”.

29. In the period from 307 to 324. AD the value of one pound of gold in Rome increased from 100,000 denarii (Roman coin) to 300,000 denarii. By the middle of the fourth century, a pound of gold was worth 2,120,000,000 denarii. This is a clear example of rampant inflation, which can be partially blamed for the collapse of the Roman Empire.

30. English coinage testing (public testing of the quality of gold) began in England in 1282 and continues to this day. The term “pyx” comes from boxwood chests in which coins are stored, the quality of which I will check. Today, coins are checked for compliance with diameter, as well as standard weight and chemical composition.

31. In the fourteenth century, molten gold mixed with crushed emeralds was used to treat the bubonic plague.

32. In 1511, the Spanish king Ferdinand expressed the legendary phrase: “Get gold humanely, if possible - if not, get it, despite any dangers.”

33. Both the Greeks and Jews began practicing alchemy in the 300s BC. The search for ways to turn base metals into gold reached its apogee at the end of the Middle Ages and the Renaissance.

34. In 1599, the Spanish governor imposed such a heavy tax on the Jivaro tribe that they were executed by having molten gold poured down their throats. This type of execution was widely practiced by the Spanish Inquisition and the Romans.

35. The gold ducat, introduced into circulation in Venice in 1284, remained the most popular coin in the world for 500 years. Ducat means “prince” in Latin. This coin was used during Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet, and is also mentioned in the play The Merchant of Venice. The rapper Ice Cube sings about golden ducats in one of his compositions (“I Ain’t the One”) and they are also mentioned in the science fiction film “Babylon 5” as about the Centauri money race.

36. The US Mint originally issued solid gold coins in denominations of $2.50, $10 and $15. They stopped minting precious coins in 1933 with the advent of the Great Depression.

37. The 49ers American football team was named after the gold miners who arrived in Northern California in 1849 during the Gold Rush.

38. Gold and copper are the first metals discovered by people (the first discovery supposedly occurred 5000 BC).

39. The cost of gold is decisive for most of the world's currencies. After World War II, the United States launched the Bretton Woods system, under which the value of one American dollar was 1.35 troy ounces of gold (1 ounce = 888.671 mg). The system was officially closed in 1971 when gold reserves became insufficient to cover the value of paper money in circulation.

40. The largest reserves of gold are in the vault of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York - there are more than 500,000 gold bars (25% of the world's reserves). The bank contains more gold than Fort Knox, and much of the treasure belongs to foreign governments.

41. The term “troy ounce” of gold comes from the name of the French city of Troyes, where the world’s first weighing system for precious metals and stones was created. One troy ounce is equal to the weight of 480 grains (one grain weighs exactly 64.79892 mg).

42. The gold standard was abolished, and in its place came the currency standard adopted by the government of most countries - fiat, or fiat money. US Presidents Thomas Jefferson and Andrew Jackson strongly opposed this decree, as they agreed with the opinion of most economists who were convinced that fiat increases the cyclical nature of recessions and rises in inflation.

43. The depth of the South African mines where gold is mined reaches 3.6 km, and the air temperature there is 54 degrees Celsius. To produce one ounce of gold requires 38 man-hours of work, 140 liters of water, the presence of chemicals (acids, cyanide, lead, borax, lime), and enough electricity to supply a residential building for 10 days. To recover from the depths of Africa the annual volume of gold mined on the mainland (about 500 tons), it is necessary to raise more than 700 million tons of soil to the surface of the earth and replant.

44. Throughout the history of gold mining, approximately 142,000 tons of gold have been removed from the earth. If we assume the value of gold to be $1,000 per ounce, the total value of the metal would be approximately $4.5 trillion. With approximately $7.6 trillion in circulation and deposits in the United States alone, a return to the gold standard is impossible. Although most experts believe that a return to the use of gold coins is unrealistic, some libertarians and objectivists believe that the introduction of a gold standard could ease inflationary risks and limit the influence of government.

45. The first officially recorded gold nugget was mined in the United States of America, in Cabarru, North Carolina. He weighed 17 pounds (7.7 kg). It was North Carolina that became the birthplace of the Gold Rush. After a second nugget was discovered here in 1803.

46. In 1848, while building a sawmill for George Sutter near Sacramento, John Marshall discovered flakes of gold in the ground. This discovery caused a “gold rush” in the American West, and led to its active settlement.

47. In 1933, Franklin Roosevelt signed Executive Order 6102, prohibiting the hoarding of gold by American citizens. Those who disobeyed were punished by a fine of $10,000 or 10 years in prison. Jewelers, dentists, electricians and other “industrial” workers were not covered by this decree.

48. Tiny grains of gold are used by the Amersham Corporation of Illinois to determine the functions of specific proteins and treat various diseases.

49. The purity of gold is determined in carats. The term "carat" comes from carob seeds, which are used in Middle Eastern countries for weighing. Carats are leguminous fruits, each carob pod weighs 1/5 g (200 mg).

50. The carat weight of gold can be 10, 12, 14, 18, 22 or 24. The higher this number, the higher the quality of the gold. “Fine gold” is considered to have a minimum weight of 10 carats. “The purest gold” is 24 carats, however it also contains a small amount of copper. Pure gold is so soft and malleable that it can be molded by hand.

Here is another interesting, but terribly controversial version:

Dr. Willbold noticed a 15 ppm reduction in the amount of the tungsten-182 isotope in the modern rock compared to the Greenland rock.

This small but significant change fits perfectly with what was sought to be proven - that the excess of available gold on Earth was a positive side effect of meteorite bombardment.

But now his path to the core is closed, and a large amount of this gold is simply doomed to end up in our hands.

Neutron star merger

And another opinion from another scientist:

The origin of gold remained unclear because, unlike lighter elements such as carbon or iron, it cannot be formed directly inside a star, admitted one of the researchers at the center, Edo Berger.

The fact is that neutron-rich substances ejected during the collapse of neutron stars can generate elements that undergo radioactive decay, while emitting a glow primarily in the infrared range, Berger explained. “And we believe that a gamma-ray burst ejects about one-hundredth of the solar mass of material, including gold.” Moreover, the amount of gold produced and ejected during the merger of two neutron stars can be comparable to the mass of 10 Moons. And the cost of such an amount of precious metal would be equal to 10 octillions of dollars - that’s 100 trillion squared.

For reference, an octillion is a million septillion, or a million to the seventh power; a number equal to 1042, written in decimal as a one followed by 42 zeros.

Almost all heavy metals “sank” into the Earth’s mantle at the very early stage of the formation of our planet; it was they who formed the solid metal core in the center of the Earth.

Alchemists of the 20th century

And more details about gold:

Gold in the bowels of the earth

Gold mining

Gold production in Russia averages about 170 tons per year: 150 tons are mined from gold deposits and approximately 20 tons are associated and secondary production. The cost of production of one ounce varies widely, highly depends on the quality of reserves, type of mining, method of processing and is approximately $150-550 per ounce.

A gold nugget is a naturally occurring formation of precious metal. In bodies of water you can often find smaller particles of gold in placers and in the form of sand. Nuggets are most often extracted from underground, in mining sites; they are also found in so-called “residual deposits”, where weathering and destruction of gold-bearing veins occurred many hundreds of years ago. Nuggets can also be found in gold mining areas, especially after the work of gold dredges.

The largest gold nugget, Welcome Stranger, was found in Australia in 1869. Its weight is 97.14 kg. An exact copy of the nugget is kept in Melbourne.

The origin of gold nuggets is the subject of much scientific debate. Gold nuggets form when clusters of gold crystals, exposed to very hot water or ultra-high temperatures, fill cracks in minerals like quartz or other hard rocks. Later, under the influence of gravity and atmospheric phenomena, the nuggets move to depth, leaving their “shelter”.

However, many gold nuggets are found in areas where there is no lode gold, but there is a lot of placer gold.

Here are 5 more geological theories on how gold nuggets are formed:

1) Snowball.

Gold nuggets form because gold is a very malleable metal. As they move, the fine gold particles can virtually fuse together in a manner similar to cold welding. Moreover, under the influence of pressure or movement along the bed of a river or stream. So, according to this theory, a nugget is a kind of “snowball” of smaller nuggets, gravel, and other substances. By the way, platinum nuggets, on the contrary, disintegrate and become smaller and smaller.

2) Sediment.

Gold nuggets form as sediment from groundwater. It is known that if gold is dissolved in water, it tends to move downward, so if gold settles in groundwater, it will settle on accessible rocks. Over time, the mass of gold “plate” increases until it turns into a nugget.

3) Gold stones.

Gold nuggets are formed from large gold stones that fall apart. That's why they are so difficult to find (virtually impossible).

4) Blurring.

Gold nuggets from modern mining sites are the remains of erosion of large gold-bearing veins. This process took thousands or millions of years.

5) Top layer.

Gold nuggets are just the top portion of a gold ore vein. Geological exploration confirms this. Often nuggets are harbingers of a gold-bearing vein.

Note that nuggets in nature are most often found with 80% - 92% purity. In Australia the numbers start at 95%. The purity of the metal content can be very roughly estimated by the color of the nugget: the richer and deeper the orange-yellow tint, the higher the gold content.

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