Scientists have used a new technique to synthesize diamonds at normal, atmospheric pressure and without a starter gem, which could make the precious gemstones easier to grow in the lab.
    • Dorkyd68@lemmy.worldEnglish
      681·
      6 months ago

      Folks like de beers hoard diamonds and jack up prices to make folks think they are more rare that what they really are. We gotta stop the cycle and buy lab grown or use an entirely different stone all together. Diamonds are for basic bitches anyhow

          • thisbenzingring@lemmy.sdf.orgEnglish
            3·
            6 months ago

            I got my wife a antique sapphire ring to replace the engagement ring that was stolen in a burglary. When the sun hits that jem, it’s like staring into the deepest clear ocean. I was in the Navy and remember when we were coming to port in Honolulu. The water was the bluest blue I’d ever seen. Old sapphire gives me the same feels

      • sushibowl@feddit.nlEnglish
        7·
        6 months ago

        Recommend looking into moissanite also if you like diamonds but don’t want to support the industry. Very similar looking, better in some ways. And because it hardly occurs naturally at all, you can only buy synthetic.

      • qyronEnglish
        2·
        6 months ago

        Use metal and artistic value, like this.

        And if the pattern is open enough, sun ligh will leave the mark on the skin. It’s one very discreet way to keep the “mark” of who we love, skin deep.

        • i_love_FFT@lemmy.mlEnglish
          13·
          6 months ago

          So you mean it might be possible to remove the wedding ring without leaving a mark, making it easier to hide that you’re married?

          • qyronEnglish
            5·
            6 months ago

            What I wanted to convey is, if the mesh is fine enough, the pattern can get marked on the skin, leaving an elegant but discreet - shall we call it - love brand behind.

            If you’re going to cheat, at least be bold enough about it and keep the wedding band on.

            • i_love_FFT@lemmy.mlEnglish
              11·
              6 months ago

              Hehe, yeah I intentionally misunderstood your comment to make a joke…

              With my so, we actually talked about getting a ring tattoo instead of an actual ring because of how we both never wear jewellery.

              • qyronEnglish
                2·
                6 months ago

                Some good humored banter never hurt anybody.

                That is the sole thing I draw the line. Scynical as it may sound, ink on skin, no. It feels as an ownership brand that can never be taken off or thrown away.

                I personally dislike the notion of being permanent on another life. Either because things don’t work, people grow apart or someone simply dies, from misfortune, sickness or old age, nobody should be tied to another, in any way. Life should go on. Must.

                And I’m happily and for a long time monogamous.

    • KeenFlame@feddit.nuEnglish
      53·
      6 months ago

      ??? The strongest material available to us seems worthless to manufacture to you??

          • NeatNit@discuss.tchncs.deEnglish
            2·
            6 months ago

            Compared to their artificially inflated price. They’re obviously useful in industry - mainly for their thermal conductivity and their hardness - but their price as a jewel is complete bullshit. They’re not rare at all in nature, but one company controls all of them and uses advertising to drive up demand and public perception.

  • Blue_Morpho@lemmy.worldEnglish
    75·
    6 months ago

    These diamonds are too tiny for jewelry but I don’t care.

    I want a diamond heat spreader for my CPU!

  • NeoNachtwaechter@lemmy.worldEnglish
    602·
    6 months ago

    One problem is that the diamonds grown with this technique are tiny

    So the next we need is a way to shrink the women so that they fit.

  • LordKitsuna@lemmy.worldEnglish
    521·
    6 months ago

    Everyone always thinks the jewelry when they think of diamonds but I am excited for the prospects of what cheap lab-grown diamonds can do for manufacturing. Diamonds are electrically insulative and yet 10 times more thermally conductive than copper. There are a LOT of industries that would be VERY interested in that.

    Hell, it would probably be useful in CPU substrate as well. Instead of silicon semi conductor doping if these could be made precisely enough you could use diamond for the insulation layers and gain that insane heat transfer efficiency to help with avoiding Hotspots. Maybe that’s too thin to matter that much not sure

    • Hugh_Jeggs@lemm.eeEnglish
      271·
      6 months ago

      Heavily used in the building industry too. Concrete saws, tile cutters etc, all expensive as fuck

    • cucumber_sandwich@lemmy.worldEnglish
      2·
      6 months ago

      Silicon carbide is much more interesting for the semiconductor industry. With pure carbon there is a lot of lattice mismatch between diamond and single crystal silicon which introduces strain and defects, both of which reduce yield in chip manufacturing.

  • TurboHarbinger@feddit.clEnglish
    211·
    6 months ago

    Similar conditions are employed in the method currently used to synthesize 99% of all artificially created diamonds. Called high-pressure and high-temperature (HPHT) growth, this method uses these extreme settings to coax carbon dissolved in liquid metals, like iron, to convert it to diamond around a small seed, or starter diamond.

    Cool. I don’t know how expensive this process is right now, but it seems cheaper to do, at least on mass production.

    Edit: I wonder if they could make a tether out of this thing.

  • Grimy@lemmy.worldEnglish
    20·
    6 months ago

    The picture is a bit misleading, they are super tiny! Very cool thought.

  • GreatTitEnthusiast@mander.xyzEnglish
    16·
    6 months ago

    However, the new method has its own challenges. One problem is that the diamonds grown with this technique are tiny; the largest ones are hundreds of thousands of times smaller than the ones grown with HPHT. That makes them too small to be used as jewels.

    Not going to be wearing these any time soon

    • elliot_crane@lemmy.worldEnglish
      24·
      6 months ago

      Just wear hundreds of thousands of them glued together, problem solved.

      On a more realistic note though, the applications of this will probably be industrial for a good while. I found it interesting how the article mentions that they were able to develop a diamond coating over their growth substrate. That probably has some cool applications in industrial settings where diamond-plated materials are used.

          • Revan343@lemmy.caEnglish
            10·
            6 months ago

            It depends; if a company can use this to make them stupid cheap, then selling them stupid cheap to undercut all their competitors could still make them more money than keeping the price the same and pocketing the saved production costs.

            • Sunforged@lemmy.mlEnglish
              8·
              6 months ago

              I was making a jab. I’m aware of market forces, but price memory is a thing and often the true cost of production isn’t reflected in consumer pricing. Especially when an industry just decides they can keep prices where they are if not raise them, looking at you egg producers.

    • sp3ctr4l@lemmy.zipEnglish
      7·
      6 months ago

      Not useful for jewelry, but possibly quite useful for many manufacturing or industrial purposes?

    • AlpacaChariot@lemmy.worldEnglish
      2·
      6 months ago

      We have a while to wait before everyone has microdiamonds in their testicles, but one day we’ll get there!

  • intensely_human@lemm.eeEnglish
    13·
    6 months ago

    Do we really want to use the word “groundbreaking” to describe advances in synthetic minerals?

  • expatriado@lemmy.worldEnglish
    6·
    6 months ago

    they are small, but the large diamonds are made from seeds, so still can be used for that, or techniques can improve for larger size production in the future, also, small diamonds are useful for cutting machines

  • 👍Maximum Derek👍@discuss.tchncs.deEnglish
    3·
    6 months ago

    Either JPL or LM (I can’t remember which) was working on a HTHP system with the goal of being able to grow diamonds with ICs built in. I wonder if this has that potential.