Gemesis (synthetic Diamonds)

Q: Related to marriage: I'm thinking DeBeers's time is about up. There was a recent article in our paper about "Gemesis," a local company that makes diamonds. From that article, it looks like the problems with manmade diamonds have been pretty much solved. According to that article, there are only three machines in the U.S. that can tell a manmade diamond from a natural one -- and the only way jewelers can tell they have a Gemesis stone, is because the company etches their logo on their stones. (The logo is visible only at 200x magnification.) This article slants somewhat the other way, pooh-poohing manmade jems. I figure, regardless of the current quality of these jems, they're only going to improve in future. Since manmade diamonds cost 50%-75% less than natural diamonds, Debeers is either finished, or they're going to have to cut prices. I love this line: "Disagreeing is William Boyajian, president of the Gemological Institute of America, who advises consumers not to worry." Worry about what? Paying half-price for real diamonds? And they are real. I think in the future, buying a natural diamond will make about as much sense as buying naturally-occuring aluminum (which is very expensive and rare).

A:contraption about the size of a washing machine is needed to produce the synthetic diamonds. The machine squeezes a shard of diamond at 850,000 pounds of pressure per square inch and at a temperature of 3,000 degrees Fahrenheit. Graphite and secret-ingredient catalysts are added to stimulate carbon growth around the shard. It takes about 50 hours to make a diamond of at least 1.6 carats. Reza Abbaschian, chairman of UF's Materials Science and Engineering Department, says, "Even with a magnifying glass, a professional jeweler could not tell the difference between our synthetic diamonds and naturally occurring ones." Disagreeing is William Boyajian, president of the Gemological Institute of America, who advises consumers not to worry. "Synthetic diamonds are easy for a professional jeweler to identify. We don't see synthetics penetrating the marketplace since gem-quality synthetic diamonds are still rare." Both synthetic and naturally occurring diamonds are 100 percent carbon. On the atomic level, natural diamonds can include paired nitrogen atoms, while synthetics have single nitrogen atoms. Because of the presence of unpaired nitrogen, synthetics tend to have a yellowish hue. Sometimes this can be seen with the naked eye. However, natural yellow diamonds do exist. Synthetics frequently include metal, such as nickel, iron and titanium, which are used either as catalysts during the diamond-making process or to absorb the nitrogen. Naturally occurring diamonds are about 900 million to 3.5 billion years old. Synthetics have been made since the 1950s for industrial use. In 1970, the first gem-quality synthetic was produced. Stephen Haggerty thinks natural diamonds contain carbon from meteorites. Synthetics, on the other hand, begin with a diamond "seed," which can be a shard of a fully formed synthetic diamond. Special infrared microscopy detectors can identify manmade diamonds. DeBeers, which controls the world's diamond market, uses a patented instrument called Diamond Sure. DeBeers also often laser prints a mark on its synthetics, as the firm is involved in both jewelry and producing industrial diamonds.

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