by Rob Bates

Colorless gem-quality stones, but no one seems to have done it on a large scale. "It's hard to produce a high-quality synthetic diamond,' notes Shigley. "They tend to be more included and fractured."

In fact, some think mass-producing near-colorless gem-quality stones is impossible. Even Grizenko, who is producing blue, red, and pink synthetics--and sell-  them at "a fraction" of the cost of naturals does not think it's possible to mass-produce near-colorless synthetics economically'. "It's hard to grow a good white, because you have to carefully control for things like nitrogen," he observes.

For now, there are only fancy colored synthetics on the market, and a pretty limited number at that.  The industry doesn't seem worried about synthetic fancy-colored stones, since most colored diamonds are sent to labs anyway to document origin of color. 

But near-colorless synthetics are. another matter. Even though diamond dealers don't think gem-quality near-colorless synthetics will hurt the market for naturals---just as the market for emeralds, rubies, and other colored gems hasn't been damaged by synthetics--detection could be a big problem. Like synthetic moissanite, synthetic stones fool a thermal tester into reading "diamond" because that's technically what they are. But visual detection of synthetic diamonds, unlike moissanite, isn't easy. "It's a little harder to detect," Shigley says. "To me the features seem fairly distinctive, but I'm a little biased because I've seen a number of samples." (For a list of the identifying characteristics of synthetics, see "How to Detect Synthetics," p. 127.) All this has led industry leaders to call for a synthetic-sniffing "black box" along the lines of a thermal tester or the new moissanite detectors. 

One has been developed--sort of. De Beers recently introduced Diamond Sure, a machine that's inexpensive and easy to use but still has some kinks. (Synthetics are also said to be detectable by the SAS2000 Spectrophotometer, available from Adamas Gemological Laboratories in Boston. But at several thousand dollars, the machine isn't likely to be a mass-market item.) Diamond Sure's drawback is that it refers a certain number of stones, Ds and Es, to a second machine called Diamond View. Unfortunately, Diamond View is expensive and requires more skill to use, which means it will end up in far more gem labs than jewelry stores. Jewelers could lose time sniffing out these "false positives," al- though scientists note that most Ds and Es are sent to labs anyway.  

Since synthetics are not a big problem right now, De Beers isn't yet selling the two devices. They have  instead been loaned to gem labs for educational reasons--and as a precaution, to prevent the industry from being thrown for yet another loop.  

WHY RUSSIA?

What do annealed stones, synthetic diamonds, and nearly every other whispered-about diamond treatment seem to have in common? The answer is Russia. Russia is a hot-bed of gem experimentation because of a strange quirk of history. Before the collapse of the Soviet Union, "Russia invested in labs and in technologists whose sole purpose was to grow synthetic diamonds for various strategic processes, none aimed at the jewelry market," says Alex Grizenko of Ultimate Created Diamonds. After the collapse, the Russian government cut back its research and many scientists lost their jobs. "Now some grow diamonds for a living," Grizenko says.

There's also a considerable gem-growing infrastructure al- ready in place. "At one site I saw 600 [synthetic] diamond presses sitting idle," says Tom Chatham, who for a while had set up operations in Russia. "The facilities are totally unused." Yet, while Russia has an impressive storehouse of knowledge, it still has a lot of problems--as .Chatham discovered when he tried to mass-produce synthetic whites there. "It's a disaster," he says. "Officials there don't understand capitalism. They will take a building that could produce something and strip off all the copper wire so now it's useless.  lt's penny-wise and pound-foolish."  

HOW TO DETECT SYNTHETICS 

According to Dr. James Shigley, the Gemological Institute of America's director of research, visual clues for fancy-colored synthetics include:

Uneven color zoning. Synthetic color is deeper in some areas than others and marked by sharp boundaries.

Opaque, black, elongated inclusions that have a metallic luster in reflected light. Because of their metallic nature, many synthetic diamonds are attracted to magnets.

Unusual graining, with cross or stop-sign patterns that tend to follow the color zoning.

A stronger fluorescence to short-wave than long-wave ultraviolet light. (Most natural diamonds exhibit the opposite.) The fluorescence also shows a pattern, with some parts of the diamonds more fluorescent than others.

If the synthetic diamond is colorless, all these properties apply except for color zoning.

Also, when examined under an ultraviolet lamp, the colorless synthetic continues to glow for about a minute after the lamp is turned off.

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