Viewing profile — ericfranklin

The testers a typical jeweler or diamond merchant might use only identify between diamond, cubic zirconia or moissanite. They do not identify origin of a diamond. The testers that …

Major gemological labs can certainly identify a diamond's origin (mined or grown). There are many characteristics that can identify origin, and color or clarity is rarely used as t…

Correct. The Soviet technology for growing diamonds is HPHT (high pressure high temperature). There are a handful of known producers and research facilities in the former Soviet Un…

Even today there are only a couple places in the former Soviet Union that can grow gem-quality synthetic white diamonds. Their production numbers are far less than the output of a …

Diamond growers try their best to keep out impurities and imperfections. Elemental impurities do add color (nitrogen=yellow, boron=blue), same as mined diamonds, and faults and inc…

I have other comments in this thread about cost, but it basically comes down to "they cost a lot more to grow than people think", and the costs after the rough diamond is grown are…

Yes, we can sell brand-new presses along with the IP and recipes, or can consider a JV, production contract or some similar arrangement. Otherwise, for HPHT, you can find used BARS…

If a large enough production facility (no R&D) had nearly every growth cycle yield large enough, colorless, flawless diamonds (or close to it), the retail prices could come down mo…

I just added this related comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13089809 TL;DR They have very similar cost structures as mined diamonds (rough [mine vs. grow], polishing, g…

They are smaller than people think. Not counting the years of R&D, one average growth cycle for one white diamond actually costs more than what mining companies typically report fo…

The core science of diamond growth inside an HPHT cell is essentially the same (a diamond seed, heat, pressure and graphite). There are a lot of variations in the composition of th…

Yes. Cutting blades are in the middle of the industrial spectrum. They are generally 2-5mm in dimension and need to be grown relatively clean, but color does not matter, so they ar…

We do sell online: https://d.neadiamonds.com They are 100% real diamond, just grown instead of mined. A typical jeweler cannot conclusively identify a diamond's origin, however gem…

The core HPHT technology was originally developed by Soviet research institutions. After the fall of the Soviet Union, this information basically became public domain. It took deca…

For HPHT, there are three primary machine designs, but they all create intense heat and pressure, and dissolved graphite slowly builds up on a diamond seed ( 1. BARS press. It is a…

They all need polished into their final shapes (round brilliant, princess, pear, anvil, etc.), or can be sliced into plates, cubes or cylinders with lasers. HPHT (high pressure, hi…

Gemstone and high-value industrial. Industrial diamonds fit into a couple different levels. Low-grade diamonds are made spontaneously by the ton, mostly in China. They are generall…

I've been running a lab-grown diamond company since 2005. I'd be happy to answer any questions in the morning.

I've seen the induction loops "presence" sensors too. One near where I used to live would never change to green unless the sensor was triggered, but wouldn't register until your ca…

Yes, I suspect major cities already have complex and optimized traffic routing, along with full-time traffic engineers. The mid and small cities are what I experience most, but I s…

Traffic lights. While not directly personal or "Internet of Things", traffic lights could really use some AI. It would be fantastic if they could learn routine traffic patterns (ru…

If looking only at jewelry-quality diamonds, there are millions of carats of diamonds mined per year, while there are generally thousands of carats of diamonds grown per year. In t…

As a producer of synthetic diamonds ( http://d.neadiamonds.com ), I can say the production costs for jewelry-quality diamonds are not as low as people seem to think. It is one thin…

While this looks like progress, and a potential path for graphene production, it still seems a long ways off from commercial viability. Diamonds went through a similar hype. It may…