Moon-sized diamond found in space

The Register ^ | 17 February 2004 | Lucy Sherriff

[ShadowAce]

The biggest ever diamond has been found floating in space. The gem, estimated at close to 10 billion trillion trillion carats, is at the core of a dead star (BPM 37093) - a crystallised white dwarf.

The newly-discovered diamond in the sky is a whopping great chunk of crystallised carbon 50 light-years from the Earth in the constellation Centaurus. It is 2,500 miles across (the moon is approximately 2,200 miles across) and weighs 5 million trillion trillion pounds. It has been dubbed "Lucy" in reference to the Beatles' song, "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds". Diamond specialists told the research team that if nothing else, the diamond was much too big to wear*.

Theorists have long speculated that the cores of extinct white dwarves would crystallise, but until now have had no way to prove it. However, the white dwarf is not only radiant but also harmonious. It rings like a gigantic gong, undergoing constant pulsations.

"By measuring those pulsations, we were able to study the hidden interior of the white dwarf, just like seismograph measurements of earthquakes allow geologists to study the interior of the Earth. We figured out that the carbon interior of this white dwarf has solidified to form the galaxy's largest diamond," explained Travis Metcalfe, head of the team at Harvard Smithsonian Centre for Astrophysics.

Our own Sun will become a white dwarf when it dies 5 billion years from now, having first expanded to engulf almost everything in the solar system. Two billion years after that, the core will crystallise, leaving a giant diamond in its place. ®

*Ms. Lopez, please take note: there are limits...

[SouthernClaire]

And how many times have I heard...

"My Darling, I'd give you the moon and more ... if only I could."

WELL????

[Bullish]

All the wife jokes aside, that's one hard mother!

[Samwise]

A kiss on the hand may be quite continental
But diamonds are a girl's best friend.
A kiss may be grand,
But it won't pay the rental on your humble flat or help
You at the automat

Men grown cold as girls grow old,
And we all lose our charms in the end.
But square-cut or pear-shape,
These rocks don't lose their shape

Diamonds are a girl's best friend.
Diamonds are a girl's best friend

[Bernard Marx]

The oldest known diamonds have dark-colored imperfections within their structure.

Which ones are those? Any idea how they're dated? All diatremes I'm aware of are very old.

[null and void]

It's actually more 'series' than the guy with the high temperature water well!

Ping!

(You're never going to live it down...)

[null and void]

Did that guy ever show up again or is he lost forever in the black SUV's?

Yup. He's OK. But he'd never going to live it down...

[King Prout]

PERFECT QUOTE AND PIC FOR THIS.
damn capslock

just mindboggling, and already I'm thinking "what uses could a diamond that big have?"

[King Prout]

really? I was under the impreassion thst the valence bonds of carbon in the adamantine configuration were chemically inert and very stable at STP.

[farmfriend]

It has been dubbed "Lucy" in reference to the Beatles' song, "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds".

Naming it after LSD, there is an intelligent move.

[Bernard Marx]

the Jewelers Vigilance Committee

LOL!!!!!!! Do you have the remotest idea what the JVC is and what it does? That's hilarious!

[farmfriend]

Now what will they name the large chunk of purple microdot they discover?

Glad I wasn't the only one to catch that.

[capitan_refugio]

Because of the pressures and temperatures needed to synthesize diamonds, it is reasonable to conclude that they are naturally former in the upper(?) mantle.

Diamonds are often associated with kimberlite "pipes" and, if I recall, carbonatite complexes (as in the Magnet Cove, Arkansas area). Historically, many diamonds have been found in stream gravels and offshore bars, suggesting that they were eroded from another rock body.

Major diamond areas have been found in southern Africa, Brazil, India, and Russia. Diamonds tend to be found in the continental cratons - the oldest part of the continent. Inclusions in the diamonds can be isotopically dated, and the results show that the diamonds are invariably older than the kimberlites with which they are associated. This means the pipes were just the conveyor belt from the mantle to the upper crust. I think all natural diamonds are at least a billion years old, but the kimberlite pipes range in age from pre-Cambrian to Cenozoic. The Kimberly, South Africa, occurence is something like 100 million years old.

Which gets back to my original statement and your reply. You are absolutely correct if you say diamonds are all very old. The point I was making was the amount of time they have been at or near the surface, for their "unstable" structure to begin to break down.

[capitan_refugio]

It has been a while since I cracked a crystalography book (+/- 25 years), but I'll take a stab at this.

I recall that the difference between graphite and diamond is in the arrangement of the carbon atoms and the strength of the carbon-carbon bonds. Diamond has a covalent bond; graphite has van der Waal bonds. I recognize "adamantine" as a description of "luster," so I'm not sure an "adamantine configuration" is. My Manual of Minerology does not go into enough detail.

Because of the carbon tetrahedrons in diamond, there is a lot of "open space" between the atoms. I think this accounts for diamond's cleavage. (Graphite, one the other hand, tends to be sheet-like.) So in diamond, the carbon bonds are strong, but as the crystaline structure is removed from the great pressures and temps of the mantle, the structure becomes unstable.

Sorry I don't have my crystalogrpahy book handy. It is out in the garage in a box somewhere.

[capitan_refugio]

"I'll remind my wife to wear her matching eraser earrings ..."

Art gum or Pink Pearl erasers?

[Ichneumon]

ROFL!!

That's your best ping picture-and-blurb yet.

[No Blue States]

Hehe

GMTA.

We went to the crater of Diamonds state park in Murfreesboro Arkansas. Its pretty cool. The entrance fee is $5 and you can keep any you find. They blow a siren when someone find one. Our siren never blew but where else can you hunt Diamonds in America for $5? There is a great nature trail winding around the back too.

We met a woman who lives close and searches there alot, she had diamond fever. She showed us her collection, some were white and other shades but many were canary yellow, up to fingernail size and very nice.

She said after a thunderstorm she found several just winking at her in the sunlight. You can even bring a bucket full of the dirt to sift once home. Although not every one finds a diamond, there have been some notable rocks found even recently.

If you get skunked hunting Diamonds its worth the drive a few hrs to Mount Ida to search for quartz Crystals, You will find some.

The largest Diamonds found: 1924 40.24 Uncle Sam Emerald cut, the stone now weighs 12.42 carats and sold in 1971 for $150,000. There's a replica on display in the park museum.

1964 34.25 Star of Murfreesboro Appraised at $45,000 uncut in 1964.

1926 27.21 Searcy Found near Searcy about 175 miles from Crater of Diamonds. Probably once part of some Indian's trade goods. Yet uncut and on display at Tiffany's in NYC.

1911 17.85 Unnamed Yet uncut, in the collection of the National Museum of Natural History.

1975 16.37 Amarillo Starlight Found and named by a visitor from Amarillo, TX.

1956 15.31 Star of Arkansas Found by a visitor from Dallas. Named by Governor of Arkansas. Cut to 8.27 carat marquise.

1981 8.82 Star of Shreveport Found by a visitor from Shreveport, LA.

1960 6.43 Garry Moore Diamond Probably the only diamond named for a game show host. Trisoctahedron.

Read one interesting link here:

http://users.aristotle.net/~russjohn/crater.html

"A very rare and perfect diamond has come back to where it was found. Originally weighing 3.03 carats uncut, the diamond was unearthed by Shirley Strawn, local Murfreesboro resident, in 1990. After it was cut by Lazare Kaplan International of New York in 1998, it weighs 1.09 carats. It was then sent to Peter Yantzer, laboratory director of the American Gem Society, and was discovered to grade D-flawless, 0/0/0 (cut, color, clarity). Yanter stated "this diamond is one in a billion." The Arkansas Department of Parks and Tourism purchased the stone for $34,500, "

[Jim Cane]

Do you have the remotest idea what the JVC is and what it does?

Imagine Pure Evil with a lisp. Special teams of blang festooned hit(men) wielding ivory handled revolvers (for their flopsy wrists tend to cause stovepipe jams when shooting semi-autos) to take out the faux-that-isn't-faux menace that so threatens their livelihoods.

[King Prout]

adamantine just means diamond-like
it is used casually to describe anything with properties of diamonds, usually hardness or duarability. cf: adamant

in this use, it is the valence configuration you call van der Waal bonds. This configuration is found in diamonds and boron-nitride(sp?) - a similarly hard and durable synthetic which has the additional property of not burning when used at high temp in an oxygenated atmosphere.

I'll have to take your word for the instability, though it goes against what little I recall of what I learned about that molecule.. been a long time since basic chemistry.

[Fedora]

"I'm a happy miser. . ." PS: "Hasan chop!" :)

[najida]

OHHHHH ~~squeal!~~~

I am just trying to figure out which setting to put it in (white gold, platinum.....space station....)