Study on the Relationship between Transparency and Morphology of Shoushan Stone

The Shoushan Stone is one of the famous craft carving stones in China and the transparency is one of the decisive factors to appraise its value. The better the transparency is, the higher the value is. In this paper, the mineral compositions and morphology of some Shoushan Stone samples were investigated by XRD and SEM methods. Combining with the characterization of Shoushan Stone, the relationships between the morphology and the transparency of Shoushan Stone were studied. The results show that the transparency of Shoushan Stone samples was determined by their microstructures, such as the mineral particle sizes and its arrangement, the gaps and porosity. The Shoushan Stone samples with high transparency are those with good arrangement, bigger crystal particle and less porosity and gaps.