When were zeolites discovered?
In 1755, the Swedish mineralogist Axel Fredrick Cronstedt discovered that stilbite, a natural mineral, visibly lost water when heated, and he named the class of minerals zeolites from the classical Greek words meaning ‘boiling stones.’ Zeolites were considered an obscure group of minerals with unique properties for almost 200 years, and Cronstedt was remembered primarily for discovering the element nickel.
