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Ch. 14: Synthetic Man Made Diamonds

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CHAPTER FOURTEEN
HOW TO MAKE SYNTHETIC DIAMONDS
Carbon is one of the most interesting of all the ninety-two elements, because of the many forms in which the pure element is found and the infinite number of com­pounds of which it is a component part. One of the most interesting forms of carbon is the diamond, not only be­cause of its high value but also because of the amount of work which has been done to obtain it by means of syn­thesis. A great deal of work still remains to be done before synthetic diamonds can be produced on a commercial basis.
Soon after Lavoisier demonstrated in his remarkable work that diamond was crystalline carbon, attempts at its artificial preparation were made. Many attempts have been made to manufacture synthetic diamonds, that is, to en­hance the commercial value of carbon by transforming it from its ordinary opaque black condition to limpid crystals of diamond. The attempts made in this direction have been numerous, but little has been done in a methodical and systematic manner. If we except some important works on the subject, we see from the historical side of the question, how much contradictory or doubtful matter has been pub­lished. However, while the number of experiments has been
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Ch. 13: Buying Diamonds Page of 153 Ch. 14: Synthetic Man Made Diamonds
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