Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Diamond Age Coming Soon

Posted by michael on from the cheaper-than-glass dept.

Roland Piquepaille writes "In 'The many facets of man-made diamonds,' Chemical & Engineering News (C&EN) writes that synthetic diamonds are getting bigger and cheaper. An example: for Valentine's Day, you can buy a yellow colored man-made diamond, visibly indistinguishable from a natural one, for $4,000 per carat. This is a 30% discount when compared with a natural diamond. This very long article also says that if synthetic diamond makers are targeting the jewelry market first, these new products will have an impact on many other industries. Not only is it now possible to grow bigger diamonds, you also can choose their color. 'Colored diamonds, which are valuable and very rare, can be created by introducing carefully controlled elemental impurities into the stone,' says C&EN. For instance, nitrogen produces a yellow stone. Infusing boron into the growing diamond produces a blue gem. This overview contains some details, references and photos of men-made diamonds, but read the original article for even more technical explanations if you have the time."

5 of 404 comments (clear)

  1. Re:If diamonds weren't a monopoly by AoT · · Score: 5, Interesting

    wow, and insightful first post.
    and you are so right. A few wars might stop as well if the price wasn't so artificially inflated.

    --
    A blog about stuff.
  2. Possible regulation? by glpierce · · Score: 5, Interesting

    The diamond industry (mining, cutting, and selling) is quite large. Is it possible they can convince governments to regulate the man-made ones, and have them somehow marked to allow people to note the difference? It may seem a bit out-there, but there's a lot of money at stake for a lot of people.

    --
    G
  3. Machine shop changes by jhines · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I visited a friend's workplace last week, a machine shop.

    He said that diamond tooling has made a big change in his workplace, allowing heat treated steel to be machined rather than ground.

  4. Re:If diamonds weren't a monopoly by km790816 · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Wired had a great article about this in September: The New Diamond Age

    The diamond industry is scared. It's interesting.

    (Check out the cover from this issue...Damn!)

    --
    A speech...
  5. Re:If diamonds weren't a monopoly by stevejsmith · · Score: 5, Interesting
    Miners...UNION!? They employ migrant child labor in South Africa. I doubt that they get so much as a lunch break. In fact, I think the only thing they get in addition to a few pennies a day is a full rectal exam each day after leaving the mine.

    Debeers is one of the most cruel and devious corporations in the world. Their tactics are desicable, yet oh-so-creative. They've successfully stopped Australian and Russian diamonds from being so much as marketed in the United States with these tactics, and I'm sure it'll only take their executives a small amount of time to figure out how to keep these artificial diamonds out of the market.

    You know their slogan, "a diamond is forever"? Yes, forever. Meaning you keep it forever. Meaning you don't sell it. Meaning there is no second-hand market. They really are good at eliminating markets, no?