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A rare mineral with potential industrial and medical applications has been discovered on alpine plants at Cambridge ̽��ֱ�� Botanic Garden.

A box full of diamonds, volcanic rock from Mount Vesuvius, and the geology guide that Darwin packed for his epic voyage on the Beagle will go on display in Cambridge this week as part of the first major exhibition to celebrate geological map-making.

Vital to many modern technologies yet mined in few  places, the ‘rare earth elements’ are in fact not that rare – they are just difficult to find in concentrations that make them economic to mine. Researchers from Cambridge ̽��ֱ�� and the British Antarctic Survey (BAS) are investigating whether the remarkable properties of these materials can be used to track them down from the air.

Paul Coxon (Department of Materials Science and Metallurgy) discusses the materials that have each been heralded as the new “world’s hardest material”.

Simon Redfern (Department of Earth Sciences) discusses how the "Star of Adam" sapphire was formed in the highlands of Sri Lanka.

̽��ֱ��presence of even a simple chemical reaction can delay or prevent the spreading of stored carbon dioxide in underground aquifers, new research from the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge has revealed.