- Diamonds are pure carbon with a few trace elements in the cracks, which are called inclusions. Natural colored diamonds are a lot rarer than colorless stones. For 100,000 carats of the latter that is mined, you only get a single carat of colored diamonds, on average.
- “Diamond” derives from the Greek “Adamantinos”, which means adamant or unbreakable. Colored diamonds are also called “Fancy”, a term introduced in the 1800’s by Swiss geologist Amanz Gressly.
- HPHT diamonds are grown in labs, and comprise 2% of all the diamonds in the world. The chemical structure of a real diamond is easily duplicated, allowing the cultivation of a visually similar rock in a matter of days as opposed to millions of years. It is not just the gem market, where these end up in; there are several other applications diamonds find, such as semiconductors and machine tools.