Element Six Registers CVD Diamond Mark Patent

UK Patent GB 2424903B, titled “Method of Incorporating a Mark in CVD Diamond” may hold a clue to De Beers' plans for marketing lab-made diamonds. The patent, as Chaim Even-Zohar reveals, was registered by Element Six, De Beers’ synthetics arm.

The technology enables the growth of Chemical Vapor Deposition (CVD) single crystal diamond material bearing a mark of origin or fingerprint within the stone, which “does not affect the perceived quality of the diamond material under normal viewing conditions,” Even-Zohar reveals.

According to the patent, “The mark of origin or fingerprint in a CVD single crystal diamond material is most appropriate in CVD diamond which is of high commercial or gem quality.”

The patent document outlines the possible applications for synthetic gem-quality marketing, Even-Zohar writes.

The specific features will provide one or more of the following benefits:

• “Provide a means by which to generate a distinctive mark such as a trademark.
• Enhance the identification of the synthetic nature of the diamond material.
• Provide a means by which modification of the CVD synthetic diamond material may be identified, such modification including changes to physical shape and annealing treatments such as those which modify colour.”

The patent, applied for in 2004 and approved two years later, seems to have been developed by scientists careful to assure that the marking will not impact the high commercial value of the gem-quality stones or their beauty. These considerations, Even-Zohar writes, are hardly relevant for most of the industrial synthetic diamond applications.

It is clear, he concludes, that the use of synthetics for jewelry purposes was foremost in the minds of those developing and filing this patent.

The full article by Chaim Even-Zohar is here.