Chinese scientists have created a synthetic ‘super diamond’ that is stronger than real diamonds.
Natural diamonds usually have a cubic frame (the arrangement of diamond’s carbon atoms), but the hexagonal crystal structure is known to provide a strong material.
However, the researchers say that the applications of such hexagonal diamonds (hexagonal diamonds: HD), also known as lunisolar, were still largely unknown due to their low transparency and extremely small size.
Previously, the hardest diamonds were found in places where asteroids or meteorites had fallen.
For example, lunisolar was first discovered in 1967 in the Canyon Diablo meteorite in Arizona.
A new study recently published in the journal Nature Materials describes the process of forming ‘well-crystallized, nearly pure HD’ by heating highly compressed graphite.
Researchers from Jilin University in China, who conducted the study, led by Liu Bingbing and Yao Mingwang, reported in the study that HD can be formed through a ‘post-graphite phase’.
