Massive diamond cache detected beneath Earth's surface

This makes wonder how many tonnes of diamonds might be under the surface of Mars.
 
Mortymoose said:
Everything I own is because of diamonds!
Everything I was ever taught was because of diamonds!
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Two of my family members fall into the same category, though at opposite ends of the spectrum. One works for a big mining company (you know the name). The other does highly rated academic research into the age of diamonds and the evolution of the Earth.

They are not just pretty pieces of rock: http://scholar.google.co.za/citations?user=D1kqnn4AAAAJ
 
mmmig said:
This makes wonder how many tonnes of diamonds might be under the surface of Mars.
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i was wondering of the larger planets with even more heat and pressure.

apply heat and pressure to coal(~carbon) and get diamonds, do the same to diamonds and get??? :p
 
access said:
i was wondering of the larger planets with even more heat and pressure.

apply heat and pressure to coal(~carbon) and get diamonds, do the same to diamonds and get??? :p
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The various forms of carbon are relatively well studied: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allotropes_of_carbon

The phase diagram of carbon indicates that compressing and heating diamonds does not transform them any further, although liquid and vapour phases do theoretically exist: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diamond#/media/File:Carbon_basic_phase_diagram.png
 
ForceFate said:
How much of diamonds produced annually go to abrasives industry?
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Likely quite a lot. Their applications are quite wide and varied.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synthetic_diamond

Synthetic%20diamond%20machines.jpg
 
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A somewhat related story: https://www.news.uct.ac.za/news/res...e-blue-in-blue-diamonds-could-be-from-the-sea

Blue diamonds get their colour from small quantities of boron, a chemical concentrated in Earth’s crust, trapped within them. But we know diamonds form in Earth’s mantle – well below the crust – where temperatures and pressures are high enough to forge these hardest of stones.

So how, then, does boron land up in blue diamonds?

Diamonds are composed almost entirely of carbon, but trace quantities of other elements can give them colour; without these elements, diamonds are colourless. Boron imparts a blue colour, whereas nitrogen, for example, gives a yellow hue.

Blue diamonds, like the famous Hope diamond, have long been considered unusual, but exactly how or where they are formed has remained unknown.

A new study involving UCT geologist Professor Steve Richardson reveals that a geological conveyor-belt transporting minerals from the bottom of the ocean into Earth’s deeper mantle could explain how the boron ended up in these diamonds. The article was published in the journal Nature last week.

For the study, an international team of researchers, including Richardson, analysed the minerals trapped in 46 blue diamonds. Their results show that the diamonds likely formed in Earth’s lower mantle, as much as four times deeper than most other diamonds. Their analysis also suggests that the material from which the diamonds formed contained water and came from the tectonic plates beneath the world’s oceans.

Blue diamonds, they posit, grew in the presence of rocks that were once a part of the ocean floor.
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Diagram: 2018-08-07_Illustration.jpg
 
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