14 DAY TRIAL // Diamond is renowned for being one of the most resistant materials on the planet. The carbon compound's structure is tied together in such a way that it does not allow for it to disintegrate very easily. As many of you know, diamond is also capable of cutting through pure glass, which is no mean feat. But, recently, physicists have been able to also demonstrate that the material can withstand more than one million atmospheres of pressure being exerted on it, before finally crashing. This means that diamonds crack at roughly 33 percent of the pressure at the core of our planet.
The US Department of Energy (DOE) reports that the human body is only able to handle a pressure of around 27 atmospheres, under the condition that it is applied gradually. An atmosphere is defined as the pressure that our atmosphere exerts on an object, at sea levels. The new investigation will prove invaluable in assisting physicists in determining how diamonds used during high-pressure experiments are influenced by the test environment. Additionally, geologists could gain more insight into how the material itself is formed. Details of the study appear in the January 22 issue of the respected scientific journal Physical Review B, LiveScience reports.
In the experiments, the researchers used very powerful lasers to deliver several hundred joules of energy to a diamond roughly a hundredth of a carat in size (1 carat = 200 milligrams). The work was done at the DOE Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL), under the supervision of expert physicist Stewart McWilliams. “It's a whole lot more energy than what an ordinary tabletop laser would give,” LLNL physicist and study researcher Jon Eggert says of the lasers used in the study. As the shock waves from the laser traveled through the diamond, the researchers measured the resulting pressures.
According to the readings, between one and ten million atmospheres were recorded within this very tiny piece of diamond. At one million atmospheres, the material finally breaks. “Once you go beyond that the diamond basically breaks up and fails. It's like stretching a rubber band beyond its elastic limit,” Eggert says. When the pressure was increased at around ten million atmospheres, the carbon compound finally melted. This research “could also provide insights into the ancient history of natural diamonds found on Earth and in meteorites, where shock waves caused by impact are common,” McWilliams concludes.