Containing bismuth or bearing/producing bismuth; describing mineral deposits or ores that yield bismuth.
From 'bismuth' + '-ferous' (Latin suffix meaning 'bearing' or 'producing'). Used since the 19th century in geology and mineralogy to classify ore-bearing rocks.
Bismuthiferous rocks were crucial to the Industrial Revolution but nobody knows it—bismuth compounds went into medicines, alloys, and cosmetics, making bismuthiferous deposits secretly important to modern industry despite being geologically obscure.
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