April 2021 | Lab Grown Magazine

April 2021 | The Lab Grown Diamond Resource Book 30 Traveled by Scientists Serving the Lab-Grown Diamond Sector By Joseph Kuzi T h e L o n g a n d W i n d i n g R o a d A s the past year has illustrated so conclusively, the ability of the scientific community to first comprehend the dimensions of what previously had been an un-encountered phenomenon, and then develop solutions that effectively address the challenges it created, is not necessarily a linear process. It is more evolutionary, where hypotheses based upon a growing body of knowledge are examined and tested, and then adjustments are made. The speed at which one is reliably able to make progress depends almost entirely on your scientific integrity, although every now and then a lucky break does help. Diamond Services (DS) was established in 2012 in Hong Kong as a developer and provider of gemological services and technology. Jewelry-quality, lab-grown diamonds (LGDs) were a relatively new phenomenon at the time and, from the outset, became the primary focus of our attention. Our essential philosophy was clear and has fundamentally remained consistent since the very beginning.The sustainability of any market is entirely dependentuponconsumerconfidence,andforthattobe maintained,the customer must know and understand exactly what he or she is purchasing. Our role as scientists and technology developers serving the industry is to provide the tools and services that facilitate this requirement. Soon after establishing the company, we made the bold commitment to develop, build, and release at least one new lab-grown diamond detection system per year. It was not a promise that we took lightly. Our first product, introduced in 2013, was the DiamaPen®, a hand-held laser device that is able to detect fancy yellow color LGDs. In 2014, we launched DiamaTest®, a system that screens loose and jewelry-set colorless diamonds for lab-grown stones, for which we won a prestigious JNA Award.The following year, at the Hong Kong Jewellery & Gem Fair, we presented a desktop mini-Raman Spectrometer, able to detect HPHT and CVD lab-grown synthetic diamonds. It was designed to provide diamond and jewelry companies with a technological capability that, until then, had pretty much been limited to well- equipped gem labs. A consistent feature of our operating procedure has been to review and scrupulously evaluate each step that we take. This, of course, is a recommended business principle, but it is an absolute prerequisite when that business is science- based. From what we learned about the fast- growing LGD sector, it became more evident to us that, while the technology and methods we were developing were meeting and even exceeding our expectations, our approach of packaging and releasing stand-alone systems to the market needed to be reappraised. The spectroscopic methodologies that we were employing to distinguish LGDs from natural diamonds rely on their ability to observe minute changes in the stones’ crystal growth structures.They involve using a laser to excite impurity lines within the diamond band gap, and then analyze the light emitted to obtain a spectroscopic characterization of the source.To be able to identify a diamond as being lab-grown, we had to compile a sufficiently large database of information about both lab-grown and natural diamonds. In the years following the establishment of our company, the range of lab-grown diamonds entering the market expanded. Whereas, initially, we were predominantly exposed to stones created though HPHT processes, CVD methodologies became more widespread. This demanded that we become more nuanced in recognizing spectroscopic signatures. That requirement increased further as we sought to identify lab-grown diamonds that,