Minerals Museum (rooms 401-402)
The educational-scientific museum of minerals was created together with the establishment of the Department of Applied Geology, back in the 20s of the last century. It has been developing since its foundation and its exhibit fund was filled. Samples were obtained from various deposits of the former Soviet Union and other countries of the world, acquired through exchange, collected during contractual fieldwork or well-documented exhibits donated by graduates. Currently, more than 5000 specimens collected in the museum are not only for cognitive and educational purposes, but also a significant part of them is of a scientific nature. Among the exhibits of the museum are well-ranked and geologically systematized educational and research collections of almost all deposits and deposits of Georgia. The museum is unique in Georgia with its samples. Even the earlier geological department did not have such collections of practical importance. In 2001-2002, at the exhibition "Georgia - an heirloom from the land of the Golden Fleece" held under the auspices of the then presidents of Georgia and Germany, museum exhibits were exhibited, which were placed in a thick catalog published in Germany as a sign of gratitude.
Our museum is often visited by potential investors from Italy, Austria, Israel, etc. In July of this year, at the request of the Ministry of Economy, Israeli investors got acquainted with the samples of Georgian paving stones collected in this museum, which aroused their serious interest.
The museum is located on the last floor of the third building and occupies an area of 240 square meters. It consists of two exhibition halls. There is a separate preparation, photo laboratory and warehouse.
The first hall is dedicated to the endogenous, exogenous, metamorphogenic processes of deposit origin and industrial types of minerals. Standard samples of rocks, ores and minerals typical for magmatic, pegmatitic, greisen, skarn and hydrothermal processes from different countries of the world and from Georgia are placed in glass showcases. Geological formations related to the processes of depletion, sedimentation and infiltration are placed here. A special place is occupied by samples ranked according to the complete geological cut of the world-famous metamorphogenic iron deposits - the Kursk magnetic anomaly and Krivoy Rog. The classified samples of skarn and sedimentary iron ores are located in the same hall. More than a hundred processed samples of Georgian paving stones of different sizes are exhibited separately.
The second hall is almost entirely dedicated to deposits and minerals of Georgia. Scientifically systematized expositional, educational and research exhibits are collected here. Visible models of Madneuli quarry and Zopkhito antimony deposit are exhibited here. Dozens of specimens are stored in boxes in the museum's storage, which can be used for both educational and scientific purposes.
Undergraduates and graduate students can work in the exhibition halls, as well as in the office, preparation room and photo laboratory, with the request of the head of the topic to be worked on and the permission of the museum curator.