Simpsonite

Simpsonite is an aluminum tantalum niobium oxide (tantate) named in 1938 by Harry Bowley in honor of Edward Sydney Simpson, Woollahra, Western Australia, Australia, government mineralogist and chemist of the Geological Survey of Western Australia. It forms yellow, yellow-orange, light brown or colorless, gray, adamantine to dull, translucent to nearly opaque, euhedral to subhedral crystals that are tabular to short prismatic, with forms {1010} and {0001}, and striated [0001]. Simpsonite is found as single crystals and in subparallel groups. It is an uncommon primary mineral in some Ta-rich granite pegmatites. Associated minerals include: tantalite, tantalite-(Mn), microlite, tapiolite, beryl, spodumene, montebrasite, pollucite, petalite, eucryptite, rankamaite, tourmaline, muscovite, and quartz. The type locality for simpsonite is the Tabba Tabba pegmatite, Wallareenya Station, Port Hedland Shire, Western Australia, Australia. Other notable localities include: Alto do Giz pegmatite, near Parelhas, and Onca mine, Rio Grande do Norte, Brazil; Al Hayat and Mdara mines, Bikita, and the Benson No. 3 pegmatite, Mtoko, Zimbabwe; Kola Peninsula, Russia; and the Tanco pegmatite, Bernic Lake, Manitoba, Canada. It is also found in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, from Mumba, near Lake Kivu, Kivu Province, and in the Manono pegmatite, Katanga Province.

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