Минералогическое общество, основанное в 1817 г., на протяжении своего длительного существования тесно связано с Горным институтом, его профессорами и питомцами. В работе Минералогического общества с первых лет принимали участие деятели Горного института, в частности Василий Михайлович Севергин и Дмитрий Иванович Соколов, которые своими трудами внесли очень ценный вклад в развитие геологоминералогических наук ...
Before the outbreak of the First World War, the level of economic development of tsarist Russia was very low, especially in the mining industry. In 1913 coal production in Russia amounted to 29 million tons (2.4% of world production), oil 9.2 million tons (20%), iron ore 9.2 million tons (5%), copper 30 thousand tons (3%), lead 1.5 thousand tons, zinc 2.9 thousand tons (a fraction of a percent of world production).
The search for chrysotile asbestos deposits is facilitated by the constant confinement of deposits to certain rocks - to serpentinites. These rocks arise mainly by metamorphosis of ultramafic intrusive rocks and occasionally - by metamorphosis of dolomitized limestones, in both cases as a result of hydrothermal processes. Naturally, the search criteria and features for chrysotile asbestos deposits associated with serpentinized ultramafic rocks will be different than for deposits associated with serpentinized limestones. The most favorable parent rocks for industrially valuable anthophyllite-asbestos deposits are large- and coarse-grained pyroxenites, forming xenoliths within younger granite intrusions, especially those areas of pyroxenites that are cut by dikes of vein derivatives of granite magma.
