NATURAL zircons generally luminesce yellow or orange under ultra-violet light 1,2. The luminescence is not caused by the tetravalent uranium responsible for the absorption spectra of zircon 1,3.
If you were to hold a grain of zircon in your hand, it would look like nothing special — just a tiny, sand-sized crystal, no bigger than the width of a hair. Yet within that humble speck lies the ...