General Description of Diamond.History Term Paper Essay

Diamond.
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General Description of Diamond.
Diamond is an element of carbon. It is merely a solid form of carbon whose atoms are organically arranged in a crystal structure known as diamond cubic. Although graphite, another solid form of carbon, melts and converts into a chemical form at room temperature and pressure, diamond is a hard solid which does not convert at all. Due to its hardness and high thermal conductivity, diamond is said to be the hardest and most durable mineral of all the minerals on earth (Mehta, 2016). Its properties have made the crystal the most fundamental part of such industrial processes as cutting other metals and manufacturing durable tools. Moreover, its constituents, anvil cells, are used in mining as it can exert maximum pressure on certain materials stored deep below the surface of the earth. Additionally, the mineral is exceptionally pure due to the arrangement of its atoms, and therefore, it cannot be easily contaminated. Diamonds age between 1 and 4 billion years, created approximately 160 and 260 kilometers deep in the earth's mantle.
Physical Properties of Diamond.
As mentioned earlier, a diamond is an allotrope of carbon. Its material properties, precisely the physical properties, are among the main reasons why artists used precious metals as a representation of art in the past and even today. It is an anisotropic opaque crystal with particular fundamental properties that can be summarized as suitable for its purpose (Libretexts.org, 2019). The following prompts state and describe the essential features of a diamond as a mineral.
Color.
Most of the gems with high-quality properties range from being colorless to slightly yellow, brown, or grayish. The most valuable and identified diamonds in history are those that are colorless. However, there are other categories of diamond gemstones that are beginning to gain recognition, such as colored diamonds, which occur naturally with a variety of hues including red, pink, yellow, orange, purple, blue, green, and brown (Libretexts.org, 2019). The use of diamonds in the art industry depends on their quality and purity, whereas the value of colored diamonds depends on their intensity.
Clarity.
The typical and the most standard diamond is pure and free from fractures and inclusive particles of colored and foreign materials (Field, 2012). This is evaluated in its appearance and the interference of light as it passes through. Colorless diamonds are clear and free of dark compositions.
Luster.
A diamond has an adamantine luster. This reflects from the proximity at which the mineral’s facets. Additionally, due to its flatness, diamond has a refractive index of 2.417 as measured through sodium light (Field, 2012). It has a high dispersion of 0.044, which is evident is the perception of the fire of cut diamonds, which manifests itself in crystalline rocks used in making jewelry. In this context, the value of diamond as a mineral is determined by its marketing, a link between its hardness and dispersion and resistivity.
Hardness.
History states that diamond is the hardest mineral in the world. Mohs hardness scale gives a diamond a hardness scale of 10 (Field, 2012).
Chemical Properties of Diamond.
On the other hand, the essential chemical properties of a diamond as a mineral include its chemical classification, chemical composition, its electrical properties, thermal conductivity, and thermal stability. The chemical classification of a diamond is that it belongs to the category of natural minerals, while its chemical composition is C. It has a 100 G resistivity that makes it an excellent electrical insulator (Field, 2012). However, naturally occurring blue diamonds are not complete conductors of electricity but p-type semiconductors. This is because the diamonds contain boron and hydrogen as impurities. In terms of thermal conductivity, diamond contains strong covalent bonds that make it an excellent conductor of it. Moreover, it has scattered photons, which gives the mineral a heat conductivity scale of 2200W/K (Bataleva et al., 2016). Also, about its thermal stability, diamond is carbon, which oxidizes in the air at the heat exceeding 700 Degrees Celsius. However, without the composition of oxygen, it can be heated past 1700 Degrees Celsius while under pressure, the maximum temperature it can take is 2500 Degrees Celsius.
Conditions under which the diamond forms in the earth, History of its mining, Processes required, and its Symbolic Significance.
Conditions Under which Diamond forms on Earth.
The most reliable science analysis shows that all the diamonds on the surface of the earth were formed in the earth's mantle and delivered to the top by a rigid volcanic shaft that cuts through a volcanic eruption. According to the geologists, the eruptions produce pipes made of kimberlite and lamproite, responsible for the mineral's deposits. Moreover, although the pipes do not contain any diamond deposits when numerous particles of the metal accumulated in one point, they form a vast pit and a profitable underground mine below the surface of the earth (Bataleva et al., 2016). Furthermore, due to erosion and weathering, other diamonds are deposited away from the pipes, forming sedimentary rocks and coastline streams of the stone. The reason the researchers claim that diamond is formed in the earth's mantle is because of the environment's favorable conditions for its development. The earth's mantle is approximately 90 miles below the surface of the planet, contains at least 1050 Degrees Celsius, and a vital pressure for diamond formation.
The conditions discussed in this section are a significant explanation of the formation of industrial diamonds. Although they are hypotheses, they are yet to be proven, and thus, they are worth mentioning. The first one states that diamonds are created in subduction zones. The analysis of the method was started when tiny particles of the mineral were found under bigger rocks and said to have been subducted into the mantle by plate tectonic processes before their return to the surface. The minimum requirements for diamond formation through subduction include 50 miles below the earth, approximately 300 Degrees Celsius and standard pressure (Barron et al., 1996). Another research explains that diamonds can be formed through an impact on the earth's surface. The scientists use the 15-millimeter diamonds found at the Popigai Crater in Northern Siberia, Russia, and Arizona. The assumption explains that when asteroids hit the surface of the earth, traveling at a speed of 20 kilometers per second, the impact produces extreme temperatures and pressure, ideal for the formation of diamond. The third theory asserts that diamonds naturally occur as meteorites in space.
The History of the Mining of Diamond.
Beginning with its history, the discovery of diamond is coined to Erasmus Jacobs in February 1867. He found a crystalline rock lying on the farm of his father when he was only 15 years old on the south bank of the Orange River in South Africa. This credited South Africa as the highest producer of diamonds for over 2000 years. Diamonds discovered in South Africa during this time were in an alluvial form (Cape Town Diamond Museum, 2016). By 1869, particles of the mineral were found a significant distance from river banks, in yellow earth below a hard rock called the Blue Ground, later named Kimberlite, hence the creation of Kimberley, a renowned mining town. After the discovery in South Africa, other countries developed their interest in search of diamonds in their homeland. This led to the modern time highest producers of diamond, including Russia, Botswana, Canada, Angola, the Democratic Republic of Congo, and Namibia.
The major producers of the mineral amount up to more than one million carats annually. However, other than those, other countries produce less than one million carats per year. These countries include Australia, Ghana, Guinea, Lesotho, Sierra Leone, and Zimbabwe. In the individual significant diamond producers, its most substantial and commercial mining started in Russia in 1957 in the Mir kimberlite shaft in Sakha, Siberia. The mine has earned Russia the title of the largest producer of quality gem diamonds in the world, and one of the superpowers. In Botswana, fundamental exploration was done in the 1950s, but its mining began in 1971in Jwaneng, one of the wealthiest mines of diamonds in the world (De Vries, 2011). Furthermore, in Canada, the exploration of the mineral started in 1991 when Chuck Fipke and Stewart Blusson found a rock bearing diamond beneath it, kicking off its mining in 1998. Lastly, South is rendered the birthplace of the mineral as its mining started in the country in the 1880s in the Big Hole mine, an 800 feet and 42-acre mining area that was discovered in 1871 and closed in 1914 after producing the world's most massive 14 million quality gem carats in a short period.
Process of turning Diamon...