What in the World Is Moissanite? The Worlds Newest Jewelry Stone.

Moissanite is a naturally occurring crystal which occurs in such small amounts and sizes as to be uncommercial. It was discovered in 1893 by Henri Moissan in a meteorite which had fallen to earth some 50000 years ago and landed in the Arizona desert. Dr Moissan started studying small fragments from this meteorite and made an astonishing discovery. Imbedded in it were tiny amounts of what looked like a new unknown jewel. Although it occurs naturally on earth it is only in tiny quantities and commercially unviable. Scientists could see its potential as a brilliant new jewelry stone and so set out to manufacture it in a lab. It's application as a jewel was immediately clear and so a new naturally occurring but also man made jewel was born. The process of making it is very new. It has only been commercially available in jewelry since 1998, so is only a few years old on the jewelry market. It is exceedingly hard to make and the process to do so is kept very secret. It can only currently be made in reasonably small quantities. There are a number of properties of jewels which are common amongst them and are therefore used for comparison purposes. These properties are beauty, colour, brilliance, fire and luster, durability and rarity. The brilliance of a jewel is created by the cut. A diamond in it's natural state for instance is pretty unimpressive. Give it a proper design and use the diamonds natural refraction of light and it is beautiful. It is the cut that does this, however it is the qualities of the jewel which produce the brilliance once it has been cut. Brilliance can be measured by the amount of light which enters a jewel compared with the amount which comes back when put under a light source. Fire refers to the ability of the stone to refract light back out in colours. The light rays break up into their original spectrum colours and that is what gives the jewel its special character. Luster is the amount of light reflected back from the surface of the jewel. Durability is the toughness, the resistance to scratching, chipping, or splitting. This is detemined by its hardness, and it is also the hardness which determines the brilliance. Rarity is reasonably obvious. It is the availability of the jewel. Moissanite equals or outperforms diamonds just about all categories. In particular it has superior brilliance, fire and luster. The only category in which it doesn