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In case you didn't know, Apollo has been developing a system to grow diamond wafers through CVD (Carbon Vapor Deposition) for you guessed it, semiconductor use.

Anyway SiC is used in jewelry too (obviously with the same properites), just never realized that it could be used to make microelectronic devices like this. Heh, my wife's engagement ring just got way cooler.

Note: I didn't say it has a higher thermal conductivity than diamond. I said that it fools the testing machines that are looking for CZ. Compared to cubic zirconia, silicon carbide has a very high thermal conductivity. You can't get much lower than CZ and still have it look like a diamond.

I did say that moissanite has a higher index of refraction than diamond, and that is true. See here: http://www.moissanite.com/unique_properties.cfm

Buy Moissanite if your girl doesn't mind. It had been selling for 1/10 of the cost of a comparible Diamond. My wife actually suggested it for her rings. Most Diamond detectors report Moissanite stones as diamond. My wife rings are very nice looking and didn't cost me two months salary.

http://www.moissanite.com/education_video.cfm

Later,
-Slashdot Junky

Moissanite.

My wife likes the sparkle, especially under standard indoor lighting. It really is more colourful and brighter than a diamond, but only costs a fraction of the price. Maybe one third the price, around here.

Of course, if your gal is one of those "but it's not a DIAAAAAMOND!" girls, you're SOL.

"I don't think man made diamonds are ever going to eclipse natural ones for jewelry" - I will have to disagree with you there.

I know there will always be a niche market (read people with more sense than money) who will always want naturally grown diamonds, however I think most folks will actually not care. Most (uneducated) diamond buyers simply look for 3 things beauty, cost , and carat (wow factor). This is the only reason stores such as Zales can stay in business. They sell the worst diamonds around (I-2's for their regular merchandise - usually up to $1500 and SI-2's for their "Zales Diamond", note that most reputable jewlers won't touch I-2 diamonds). The reason Zales (and other maul stores) sell so much merchandise is first location and 2nd the design, pricing and wow factor (1 carart ring for how much?!).

Now back to synthetic diamonds, eventually most folks will realize that choosing a natural diamond over a synthetic just "'cause it has to be naturally grown" is like choosing furniture built of trees that were grown naturally in a forrest vs using trees that were planted and grown on a farm. There both real trees (plus you'll get less defects in your furniture with the farm grown trees).

Now there's already a lot of companies out there growing diamonds. Check out:

Gemesis in Florida
Apollo Diamond (which uses Carbon Vapor Deposition)
Life Gem- turn the ashes of a deceased loved one into a diamond
There was also an interesting article about it on Wired a ways back: The New Diamond Age

And lastly the one "book" that taught me everything I could have ever wanted to know about the diamond business: The Diamond Invention Very interesting read.

Intersting note, after all the research and shopping (and shopping and more shopping) that I did when I was looking for an engagement ring (including researching Synthetic Diamonds) I decided on having a ring custom made by a local jeweler using moissanites instead of diamonds. Ended being a very beautiful and unique ring of a much higher quality than a mass produced setting and with quite a bit of geek factor to it as well. So I think folks will be accepting of synthetic diamonds once production ramps up to the demand (right now Gemesis is growing as fast as it can).

I am really lucky

Me too. I managed to talk my wife out of getting a diamond on ethical grounds. We went with moissanite instead. Her ring has a green moissanite flanked by two clear moissanite stones.

The funny thing about clear moissanite is that people refuse to believe it is not diamond, even when they are told directly. Moissanite actually has a higher index of refraction than diamond, and so it sparkles more! Plus, moissanite only costs one tenth as much as an equivelant quality diamond. Most people have never heard of it, because it is not a naturally occuring stone. The plus side to that is that I can definitively say that I know the stones came from a factory in North Carolina. Can you tell me where your diamond came from?

You can tell the difference under a jeweler's loop (if you know what you are looking for, moissanite is birefringant), but moissanite will actually fool the cubic zirconia testers that most jewelers use.

In the interest of full disclosure, I do own some stock in the company that makes moissanite. I bought the stock because I was impressed with the product, but you are welcome to take everything I say with a grain of salt.

But a totally viable alternative to Diamond is Moissanite. Better than Diamond in almost every way (except hardness, and even there it's pretty damn close). Check out: How Stuff Works or the manufacturer.

I have been married 20 years. At the time we got engaged, we bought a diamond engagement ring (joint decision, split the cost) but even so we could only afford a small diamond. But it was a symbolic thing, and my wife wore it and never took it off unless she absolutely had to.

Then around five years ago the damn stone fell out and was lost. We discussed what to do about it. We could now afford a much larger real diamond, so that was an option. But reviewing the prices and comparing them with some of the substitutes now available, there really was no contest: we agreed that diamonds were overpriced and the replacement would be cubic zirconium.

Since then I've seen and would consider a moissanite jewel, but probably would stick with the CZ choice. While in some gem-geeky respects moissanite claims to be superior to diamond, there seems to be little cost saving - rather it is promoted as something that costs pretty much the same as diamond but is "better".

The real challenge I had was to find a CZ ring in which the stone was not grossly and vulgarly oversized, and where the ring itself was made from something better than "cheap" 9ct gold. I eventually bought an elegant 18K gold ring with a solitaire CZ stone of around 1 carat size. It cost a fraction (like 10%) of what the same-sized real diamond ring would have cost, and to pretty much everyone's casual glance it looks like a decent-sized diamond.

My wife loves it, shows it off, and freely admits it isn't a diamond. I don't know if this says anything about the nature or quality of our relationship, or the people we now are versus what we once were -- you can decide.

I got my fiance a sapphire and she loves it. Most blue sapphires come from Sri Lanka, which are called Ceylon sapphires. Some of the other colors like yellow may come from the US though.

One thing to note about sapphires is that they're denser than diamonds and you'll need a greater carot size to fill the same space.

Another interesting idea is to get a tension setting. Instead of having the gem attached to a few strands of metal. The gem is actually squeezed very tighly between two parts of the band. There are only a few manufacters of this style, I purchased a Gelin & Abaci
one thing to note is that the jeweler can't set the stone ... it has to be set at the manufacturer.