Rutilated Quartz or Rutile Quartz is the name attributed to Quartz crystals that have inclusions of the needle-like mineral Rutile suspended within their crystal structure. Rutile is a mineral composed of Titanium dioxide. Rutile has an incredibly high refractive index, much higher than diamond. Rutile also has natural birefringence, which is when light waves are polarized into two wavelengths. Together, these natural properties produce an optical effect that is highly reflective and eye-catching. Rutile occurs mainly in clear to smoky quartz but is also occurs rarely in amethyst crystals. The color of the Rutile needle inclusions ranges from gold to red, black and more rarely green. In size they range from 0.1 mm up to 1 mm in diameter. Most of the commercial mining of Rutilated Quartz comes out of Brazil and India. 

Quartz is a crystalline mineral composed of bonded silicon oxygen atoms that form in a tetrahedra framework. These pyramidal atomic structures form in patterns that belong to the trigonal crystal family. A perfect chemical structure of Quartz forms in a six-sided prism terminating in a hexagonal 6 sided termination at each end. when Quartz crystalizes into this form it is called ‘twinned’ or double-termination.  It is the second most abundant mineral in Earth’s continental crust after feldspar.