January 2020 - Lab Grown Magazine

January 2020 | LG | The Lab Grown Diamond Resource Book 18 Scintillation Science The Continuing Evolution of Lab-Grown Diamonds By Dan Scott C lassics. The jewelry industry thrives on them. We wouldn’t be an industry if we didn’t offer classic bridal and fashion diamond designs for sale at every form of retail.That sets the stage for this diamond story built around a classic cornerstone. As an adjective, “classic” is defined as “judged over a period of time to be of the highest quality and outstanding of its kind.” With mild exceptions, countless jewelry designs in any collection sold anywhere at any time offer standard or “classic” designs. Routinely, diamond studs, solitaire rings and pendants, etc., are basics and bestsellers. They are required to anchor any bridal diamond collection or an entire showcase of multiple brands.Classics are mandated because they are bestsellers and because classic diamond designs offer a competitive in-case platform for unconventional or unique jewelry designs simply by comparative contrast. Strong contrast sells the opposite, that’s a fact. Global consumers still lean toward classic con- servative looks in diamond jewelry designs. But many are giving classics their own personal twist, and diamonds—whether lab-grown or mined— aren’t always part of their plan. Luckily, as history proves, this situation is a classic challenge that is often overcome. And so, the story continues. Looking Back Mankind’s desire for diamonds and the mo- tivation to create them is daunting. This passion was so potent that man had to invent a way to manufacture diamonds by his own hand. This eagerness is hardly new—we’ve been at this since 1797 when diamonds were discovered to be pure carbon. Since coal is nearly all carbon and coal was present in people’s daily lives, the concept of crushing coal to create diamonds drove people mad, bankrupt and even was responsible for the death of several others along the way. But this isn’t just a history lesson—it can’t be since we are living diamond history at this very moment. To appreciate the turning point in the lab-grown diamond story that occurred some 65 years ago, we have to rewind to 1880. A scientist named James Ballantyne Hannay claimed he had successfully synthesized a dia- mond and received notable praise at the time. It was undeserving praise, though. Analyses today show that, although he had correctly identified some structural portions used to engineer a dia- mond, he couldn’t possibly have carried them out, and thus likely presented a false claim. Under Intense Pressure Advancing to 1901, a French chemist named Ferdinand Frédéric Henri Moissan spent eight exhaustive years attempting to create a diamond. He tried using his electric arc furnace to force in- tense pressure. Alas, the technology for pressure and heat simply wasn’t up to the task in the early 1900s to formulate diamonds.But,while Moissan didn’t succeed at creating a man-made diamond, he did earn a Nobel Prize for discovering silicon carbide. His composition was branded Moissanite in his honor two years after his death. Thanks to his being extremely detailed in his research pa- pers, Moissan’s writings were later published and led to the Lely Method, an in-lab process of crys- tallized growth. It was later re-engineered and re- fined by scores of scientists, but each resulting in failed attempts to create a diamond. We should note that numerous claims of dia- mond synthesis were reported between 1879 and 1928. Many of those reports were analyzed, yet none were confirmed to be accurate. In the 1940s, the U.S. government began deep, systematic lab-grown diamond research— followed by Sweden and the Soviet Union—to grow diamonds using chemical vapor deposi- tion (CVD) and high-pressure high-temperature (HPHT)processes. Many trials; all errors. That changed, however, one wintry day in 1954. >> French chemist Ferdinand Frédéric Henri Moissan (1852 –1907) and his arc furnace, a contraption that could create intense pressure and elevate temperature, devised in the early 1800s. WhileMoissan had the right concept, it was impossible to reach the levels of pres- sure and heat required to create a lab-grown diamond. His research gave birth, however, to innovations and inventions used to this day in the lab-grown world. (Photo: Creative Commons)