Gems The provinces

Natural ornaments have been part of the history of humanity for 20,000 years. In the beginning they were organic materials, coral, amber, etc. Then came the gems, usually natural inorganic minerals that are desirable because of their beauty, rarity, sustainability and tradition. The number of minerals defined as gems is small and its economic value is calculated on the basis of color, brightness, size, carats (weight) and rarity. Currently, gems can be synthesized using comparable conditions such as those of nature. Moreover, there are minerals, natural or synthetic, who allow the same sizes as those of precious stones, for example the Zirconite.

Atoms that form minerals can be perfectly ordered or messy. In the first case we say they have crystalline structure; In the second, Amorf. When they are in a crystalline form, in some cases their external aspect (morphology) manifests the internal order of their atoms. Quartz, usually it is a rock (white, white, smoked white, etc.) But it also finds the shape of hexagonal prisms that end in tip: quartz crystals.

When the gemstone morphology does not manifest its neat internal structure, this is the size to obtain its natural faces. Each gem depends on the way in which its atoms (crystalline system) are arranged, allows different types of size. One of the most sizes is the diamond. Each size provides different brightness, depending on the number of faces. That is why the most expensive diamonds are the most shine. They are where more material is lost when they cut them.

Moreover, the diamond is the only jewel that is monoatomic: only carbon atoms. Moreover, it is a demonstration of dependence on properties with the order of atoms. When they do it in hexagonal planes, we have the graphite that is laminar, soft and black. If it does with cubic symmetry, we have the diamond, white, transparent … and the most difficult of all materials.

Properties and weight

Precious stones have many fundamental properties. So we have the color as a combination of nuance, tone and intensity. The latter is, for example, a measure of saturation or purity. Moreover, we must take into account what the optical character is called. So there are isotropic gems, in which the light is not dependent on the direction, for example the diamond; Anisotropas, in which color depends on direction, for example tourmaline; And amorphous as a amber. Related to composition is clarity. This depends on whether there are much or little mineral, fossil inclusions, etc., or whether there are many or few imperfections when ordering atoms. In some cases, inclusions increase the price.

Regarding the places where the precious stones were formed: there are people who come from watery solutions close to the surface of the metamorphic and the magmatic – the diamonds formed in the mantle, about 120 kilometers deep are formed.