Austria has a large collection of euro commemorative coins, mainly in Silver and Gold, but they also use other materials (like Niobium for example).
There has been a significant drop in the production and sale of coltan and niobium from African mines since the dramatic price spike in 2000, based on dot com speculation and multiple ordering.
The GP-B gyro consists of a nearly-perfect spherical rotating mass made of fused quartz, which provides a dielectric support for a thin layer of niobium superconducting material.
This transparent, UV-absorbing system was achieved by using an organic-inorganic heterostructure made of the p-type semiconducting polymer PEDOT:PSS film deposited on a Nb-doped strontium titanate substrate.
Autler was a pioneer in the use of small superconducting solenoids with niobium wire, producing a 2.5 T field at a temperature of 4.2 K, then achieving 9.8 T at a temperature of 1.5 K.
It was the marriage place (7 May 1788) and burial place (1822) of Sir William Herschel (in whose memory there stands a newly erected stained-glass window depicting Uranus, which he discovered, and other planets), and the burial place of Charles Hatchett who discovered niobium.