Are diamonds made from coal?

Are you wondering the question: Are diamonds made from coal? Then this article will be helpful for you. These gems are surprising because they only contain carbon. Carbon is the same element in pencil graphite and coal. Why are graphite and coal opaque and soft, whereas diamonds are transparent and hard? The position of their atoms determines everything.

While graphite only has three carbon atoms that are bonded to one another, diamonds have four carbon atoms that are bonded to one another. Diamonds appear transparent because their bonds are held together so tightly that light can pass through them. Light is entrapped between the atoms of coal and graphite, resulting in opaque and dark materials. Diamond carbon atoms bond differently than carbon atoms in other materials.

The squeezing of carbon atoms at extremely high pressures and temperatures causes them to touch more atoms. Diamonds are formed when four atoms of carbon join together at a temperature of approximately 1600°C and a pressure of approximately 50,000 times greater than that of the Earth’s surface.

About 200 kilometers (125 miles) below the surface of the earth, these conditions take place. However, neither drills nor anything else can get us there. In particular kinds of kimberlite volcanoes, diamonds are actually discovered and mined close to the surface.

When gas trapped at that depth reaches an excessively high temperature and begins to expand and rise, volcanic eruptions take place. Diamonds and rocks in the vicinity will also be pushed to the surface as the gas escapes and heads toward the planet’s surface. Diamond formation under those conditions can take up to 3 billion years, and kimberlite eruptions are uncommon. 13 million years ago was the very last one.

Diamonds, on the other hand, can be grown in laboratories by material scientists. Before the diamond-making process can begin, waivers are very small pieces of genuine diamond that are cut into very small pieces. After that, a metal device that resembles the previous conditions houses these waivers. The waivers become stones after two weeks. After that, the stones are cut and polished to the standard diamond shape.

Geologists assert that diamonds were brought to the surface in all commercial diamond deposits on Earth by deep-source volcanic eruptions. The kimberlite and lamproite pipes that diamond prospectors seek were created by these eruptions. The majority of these pipes lack diamonds or contain only a trace amount, making them of no commercial value.

On the other hand, these pipes are used to build open-pit and underground mines when they contain enough diamonds to support profitable mining. From some of these pipes, diamonds have also been weathered and eroded. These diamonds can now be found in coastal sediment and stream sedimentary (placer) deposits.

Extremely high temperatures and pressures are required for natural diamond formation. Temperatures of at least 2000 degrees Fahrenheit (or 1050 degrees Celsius) are found in these restricted areas of the Earth’s mantle, which are at least 90 miles (150 kilometers) below the surface. Diamonds can only form and remain stable in a temperature-pressure environment that is not found anywhere else.

Instead, most of it is thought to be beneath the stable interiors of the continental plates of the mantle. During deep-source volcanic eruptions, diamonds that are produced and stored in these “diamond stability zones” are released onto the Earth’s surface. These rapid eruptions quickly tear the mantle out and break it up. Humans have never witnessed this kind of extremely rare volcanic eruption.

Is coal a factor? A sedimentary rock formed coal when plant matter fell to the surface of the Earth. It rarely goes below the surface for more than 3.2 kilometers (two miles). Coal cannot have been transported from the crust to a depth significantly below the base of a continental plate. These mantle diamonds probably contain carbon that was either transported to great depths via subduction or trapped in the Earth’s interior during its formation.

Rocks thought to have been returned to the surface after being subducted deep into the mantle by plate tectonic processes have been found to contain tiny diamonds. Diamond formation in a subducting plate may occur at temperatures as low as 390 degrees Fahrenheit (200 degrees Celsius), just 50 miles (80 kilometers) below the surface. A different study found that Brazil diamonds had tiny mineral inclusions that were similar to the mineralogy of the oceanic crust.

Others have inclusions that indicate seawater subduction caused their formation. The subject of the investigation was a more recent investigation into the formation at depths of as much as 400 miles (650 kilometers) of blue, boron-containing diamonds. Inclusions on these super-deep diamonds suggest that they may have been formed by subducted oceanic crust.

Is coal a factor? For this method of making diamonds, carbon is unlikely to come from coal. Carbonate rocks like limestone, marble, and dolomite, as well as possibly plant debris in offshore sediments, are most likely carbon sources from the subduction of an oceanic plate.