The Secret of Why Diamonds are Hard
Up until now no one has really known the secret of why diamonds are hard and it has always been a mystery to scientists for many years..
But this has now changed. Chemists of the Bar-Ilan University and mechanical engineers at the Technion, Israel Institute of Technology have found out why diamonds are the hardest known substance to man.
Prof. Shmaryahu Hoz of Bar-Ilan and of the Technion in Haifa with Dr. Lior Itzhaki, Prof. Eli Altus and Prof. Harold Basch of Bar-Ilan in Ramat Gan are about to publish an article in the Journal of Physical Chemistry in which they will reveal the secret of why diamonds are hard.
There research has resulted in the discovery that interactions among atoms that are not chemically bonded directly to each other are responsible for the diamond’s hardness.
Hoz noted that, ” diamonds are made from pure carbon. Every atom of carbon in a diamond is surrounded by four additional carbon atoms directly bonded to it. However, each of these atoms is linked to three additional carbon atoms. Thus the resulting structure was very special.” he said.
Combining quantum mechanics and mechanical engineering at the nano-molecular level, the chemists and engineers, working together, found another contributor to hardness: The repulsive interaction between two atoms that are not directly bonded chemically to each other.
In research it was found that this interaction is behind the mystery and is one of the major factors behind the diamond’s super-hardness. The hardness results from the fact that diminishing the distance between these atoms induces an exponential rise in energy, the authors suggested.
In the article the researchers also predict that these discoveries will lead to the development of even more super hard materials in the not to distant future.
The secret of why diamonds are hard is an important discovery then and will have many future benefits for us all.