Fluorescent diamond particles and methods of fabricating the same
AssigneeElement Six (UK) Limited
InventorsMARK GREGORY MUNDAY, JACQUELINE HALL
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Abstract
A diamond powder comprising diamond particles having an average particle size of no more than 20 μm and a vacancy or impurity-vacancy point defect concentration of at least 1 ppm. At least 70% of the volume of diamond in the powder is formed from a single crystal growth sector. This leads to a substantially uniform concentration of vacancies or impurity-vacancy point defects in the diamond particles because the rate of impurity take-up during growth is heavily dependent on the growth sector, which in turn leads to a more uniform fluorescent response. There is also described a method for making such a powder.
Claims25
A diamond powder comprising diamond particles having an average particle size of no more than 20 μm and a vacancy or impurity-vacancy point defect concentration of at least 1 ppm, wherein at least 70% of the volume of diamond in the powder is formed from a single crystal growth sector.
A precursor diamond powder comprising diamond particles having an average particle size of no more than 1 mm and a vacancy or impurity-vacancy point defect concentration of at least 1 ppm, wherein at least 70% of the volume of diamond in the powder is formed from a single crystal growth sector.
A method of fabricating a diamond powder comprising diamond particles having an average particle size of no more than 20 μm, the method comprising:
- crushing a precursor diamond powder to form a diamond powder with an average particle size of no more than 20 μm, the diamond powder comprising diamond particles having a vacancy or impurity-vacancy point defect concentration of at least 1 ppm, wherein at least 70% of the volume of diamond in the crushed diamond powder is formed from a single crystal growth sector.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.