Memorial diamond

Memorial diamonds are artificial diamonds that are promoted as including a certain amount of carbon from human hair or cremated remains. How much carbon is extracted from ashes and is actually used varies by service provider, with some memorial diamonds containing as little as 3% memorial carbon. With the exception of Algordanza of Switzerland, service providers do not typically advertise the percentage of memorial carbon they use, but customers who have pressed other service providers for an answers to the question have often received figures around 5%, or 1 part in 20. As the memorial carbon used in these cases is of unknown graphitization level however, the percentage of the carbon in the diamond which is from the memorial source is potentially far lower than that figure.

Typically, these are diamonds created in a laboratory, often referred to as "synthetic diamonds", "cultured diamonds", or "laboratory-grown diamonds". Some memorial diamonds are graded by gemological laboratories, such as Gemological Institute of America (US) or Birmingham Assay Office (United Kingdom).[1]

Manufacturing methods may differ amongst service providers. Switzerland based Algordanza claims to use only the carbon derived from the ashes or hair supplied to them as they have developed the technique of carbon extraction to a higher level of purity.[2] Furthermore, they have conducted an audit of their own process through a legal notary [3] to effectively check that they are doing as promised. In particular, the manufacturing method of Algordanza has been covered in an article by National Geographic [4]

History

The first lab-made diamonds can be dated back to the 1950s,[5] while memorial diamonds started to appear in the market in the early 2000s. More than one company has claimed to be the first to provide memorial diamonds, and both Heart In Diamond[6] and LifeGem[7] have claimed to have a patent covering the growing of a "personalized gem diamond".

Production process

Memorial diamonds are produced using hair or ashes, with other carbon ("lab carbon") added.[8]

In case of hair, it is subjected to heat treatment to extract carbon. Some laboratories also analyze the content of hair. A hair analysis report then serves as a client assurance. The process of unique identification of a diamond and a person based on the hair composition is described in the diamond patent RU2282584 [9]

Carbon can be obtained from cremated human or animal remains in a particulate or gaseous form. The carbon is then filtered using a conventional filtering technique. The carbon and other elements are then purified and graphitized, for example by a halogen purification technique.[10]

The diamonds are then produced using the carbon extracted using conventional diamond synthesis techniques. As of 2009, only high pressure, high temperature (HPHT) processes using belt and cubic presses were used for the production of memorial diamonds.

References
  1. LONITÉ. "Diamond | Memorial Diamonds from Ashes & Hair - LONITÉ". www.lonite.com. Retrieved 2017-02-01.
  2. "THE ALGORDANZA LAB". algordanza.com.hk.
  3. "The Definitive Guide to Memorial Diamonds". algordanza.com.hk.
  4. "From diamonds to rockets, mourning the dead has gotten high-tech". nationalgeographic.com.
  5. "Near-Colorless HPHT Synthetic Diamonds from AOTC Group". gia.edu.
  6. "Personalised grown gem diamond". russianpatents.com.
  7. "Patent US20040031434 - Method of making synthetic gems comprising elements recovered from remains ..." Google Patents. Google.
  8. "Memorial Diamonds out of Cremains - anyone do this? Need Info". pricescope.com.
  9. "ПЕРСОНИФИЦИРОВАННЫЙ ВЫРАЩЕННЫЙ ЮВЕЛИРНЫЙ АЛМАЗ И СПОСОБ ЕГО ПОЛУЧЕНИЯ" [Personalised diamond creation process]. ntpo.com (in Russian).
  10. "METHOD FOR MAKING SYNTHETIC GEMS COMPRISING ELEMENTS RECOVERED FROM COMPLETE OR PARTIAL HUMAN OR ANIMAL REMAINS AND THE PRODUCT THEREOF - INTERNAT RES & RECOVERY CORP". freepatentsonline.com.
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