Assignment 16 - Pearl Formation, Types, and Market Flashcards
An organic gem that forms in
the body of a mollusk.
Pearl
A pearl that forms without human assistance.
Natural pearl
A pearl formed as the result of human intervention in the formation process.
Cultured pearl
The organ that lines the mollusk’s shell, encloses its soft body, and contains the cells that form pearl sacs and secrete nacre.
Mantle
The natural substance produced by pearl-bearing mollusks to make pearls.
Nacre
A crystallized form of calcium carbonate found in nacre.
Aragonite
The organic “glue” in nacre that holds aragonite platelets together.
Conchiolin
What causes a mollusk to form a pearl?
Natural pearl formation starts when a foreign object gets inside a pearl-bearing mollusk’s shell and irritates its soft tissue
Why did the natural pearl market decline?
Pearl culturing, plastic buttons, and oil drilling all contributed to the decline of the natural pearl industry.
How do natural pearls fit into today’s marketplace?
Today, there’s little financial
incentive to harvest mollusks for natural pearls. A shell diver might search hundreds or even thousands of mollusks without finding a single natural pearl. And of those found, few would be gem quality.
In the US, shell divers find natural pearls in the freshwater mussel shells they collect for use in making bead nuclei.
Some natural pearls found in the marketplace are from old inventories or estate sales.
The nacreous layer inside a pearl-bearing mollusk’s shell.
Mother-of-pearl
Pearl with a non-concentric structure of aragonite crystals resulting in different luster and appearance from nacreous
pearls.
Non-nacreous pearl
Optical phenomenon created in
some non-nacreous pearls when intersecting groups of crystals interact with light.
Flame structure
A cultured pearl grown around a nucleus implanted under the mantle tissue inside a mollusk’s shell.
Cultured blister pearl
A bead used as the core of a cultured pearl, usually made from a freshwater mussel shell.
Bead nucleus