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