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Blue Amber
Blue amber is rare. The blue color derives, not from
pigmentation or a distribution of fine light scattering particles,
but from flourescence. This is a process whereby ultra-violet or violet
light is absorbed by a solid and re-emitted as blue or green light.
Many molecules are able to effect this conversion. The process is
used in fluorescent lamps which convert ultra-violet light into a
range of visible light colors and in the laundry brighteners which
are applied to white shirts and textiles. It is a particular property
of many aromatic molecules with condensed benzene rings such as anthracene
and naphthacene. Anthracene is colorless, when it is irradiated with
invisible ultra-violet light in the dark it luminesces a brilliant
blue violet. If the anthracene contains a trace of naphthacene, it
luminesces a brilliant green, under ultraviolet irradiation.
The specimens of blue and green amber under ultra-violet irradiation
in the dark show this same brilliant luminescence and in the absence
of analytical and spectroscopic evidence, it would be reasonable
to attribute it to the presence of similar polynuclear aromatic
molecules. These could be produced by thermal polymerization process
which might be initiated by irradiation.
The blue or green coloration appears most vividly in reflected sunlight.
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