Gem Section

Associated with the American Federation of Mineral Societies Gem Section
Member of the Southeast Federation of Mineral Societies

Carl Ziglin - Gem Section Chair
gems@gamineral.org

Gem Section:

March meeting:
Monday March 29th, 6:30 dinner; 7:30 meeting
Organic gems and jewelry

Many jewelry items are the byproduct of living things. These will be the topic of this month's gem section. Pearls, mother of pearl, amber, coral, ivory, tagua nut, jet, and maybe even wood will be included. Are there others?
You'll have to come to the meeting to find out!

Bring your organic jewelry and we'll compare what we all have in our collections.

We will be meeting at:
The home of Pam Martin
1535 Duluth Highway, #1102
Lawrenceville, GA 30043

Weather report: It does not look foggy this month. Check the following web page: http://www.weather.fog.gov/GMS/gemsection/forecast/2010/march

Please phone 678-225-5656 to RSVP.

Answer to last month's Gem Section Trivia:
What was the first gem stone to be created in a lab? Ruby (corundum) was created in a lab in 1837. That's the earliest
reference I can find. If you know of something earlier, please let me know.

Gem Section Trivia:
Is a simulated gem the same thing as a synthetic gem?

We're looking for hosts for this year's gem section meetings. Please see the list below and let me know if you're interested:

April 26
June 28
July 26
August 30
September 27
October 25
November 29

I'm trying to line up meeting locations further in advance so the newsletter articles can be in (closer to) on time!

Carl Ziglin, Gem Chair
995 Laurel Mill Drive
Roswell GA 30076-2371
770-998-5975
gems@gamineral.org

Kim Cochran - GMS Curator

2004 Curator Report to the Membership:
2004 GMS GEM BOX Report:
For those who may not know, the gem box is a small assortment of gems and jewelry that has been purchased by GMS at wholesale and is sold at cost.

LapidaryLINKS

**New, lower temperature way found to make diamonds"**
01:21 PM ET 07/09/98 Release at 4 p.m. EDT WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Chinese scientists Thursday reported finding a new way to make diamonds, heating carbon and sodium at temperatures lower than previously used. They said their method was not perfect but a step to devising better ways to make diamond, which is widely used in industry. The researchers from Structure Research Laboratory and Department of Chemistry at the University of Science and Technology in Hefei, China, used a process called metallic reduction-pyrolysis-catalysis (RPC). "This method is a simple means of forming diamond,'' they wrote in a report published in the journal Science. The RPC process produced diamond powder at a yield of about 2 percent and graphite -- which, like diamond, is pure carbon but in the form of a grayish powder rather than the very hard crystal that is a diamond. Sodium, a nickel-cobalt alloy and carbon tetrachloride were put into a stainless steel container and heated at 1,290 degrees Fahrenheit for 48 hours, then removed to cool to room temperature. "This temperature is much lower than that of traditional methods,'' they wrote. Their tiny, grayish-black diamonds are a far cry from the most valuable industrial diamonds. "Improvements in the process of synthesizing of diamonds are still needed,'' they wrote. Diamonds have been synthesized previously at 1,470 degrees Fahrenheit), using carbon, water and metal. Synthetic diamonds differ in size, shape and impurities from natural diamonds. They also can be formed with the use of explosives. The researchers ran their gray-black powder through a X-ray diffractometer, a transmission electron microscopy and a Raman spectrum to confirm the formation of diamonds. They said finding a catalyst better than sodium may help in the process of making diamonds. ^REUTERS@


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