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Sphalerite in jewelry
Sphalerite began to be used quite late in jewelry production. The first attempts to face it began in the second half of the 20th century. At first, faceted sphalerite was popular only as a collection mineral. But since the 1990s, faceted sphalerites have been widely used as jewelry inserts in jewelry.
Faceted sphalerite, having a high refractive index, is characterized by high light dispersion, which determines its good play and is an attractive feature of this stone. The disadvantages of fluorite are its low relative hardness (3.5-4.0 on the Mohs scale) and perfect cleavage. And if the negative effect of cleavage can be minimized by choosing a shape and type of cut, then the effect of low hardness is much more difficult to limit. To prevent wear of faceted stones, they are placed either in closed frames, or they are provided with a caste design that prevents wear of the stone surface. One of the interesting solutions when cutting sphalerite was the choice of cutting a stone with a top in the form of a cabochon with facets (faces) in the form of “windows” on the curved surface of the cabochon.
Mainly the low-iron variety of sphalerite - kleiophane, characterized by light colors, is cut. The color range of such stones is most often represented by red and orange colors with brown and brown tints, yellow and green stones are also found.
Recently, jewelry exhibitions have increasingly seen jewelry with sphalerite surrounded by other jewelry stones, such as jewelry ("noble") opal, diamonds, colored sapphires and others, made at a high artistic and technological level.
В геммологической практике бывают весьма увлекательные случаи с диагностикой ювелирных вставок
Но помимо редкости цвета и высокой стоимости таких камней, многие розовые камни выделяются одной замечательной особенностью – они проявляют плеохроизм, то есть в зависимости от положения осмотра камня он может иметь дополнительные оттенки – оранжевый или пурпурный.
Currently, gemstones are produced by two fundamentally different technological methods - the High Pressure - High Temperature method (“HPHT”, High-pressure & High-temperature) and the Chemical Vapor Deposition (“CVD”, Chemical vapor deposition) method. The "HPHT" method is the most tested classical synthesis method, which can be used both carbon deposition on diamond from flux melts and catalytic reactions. In "CVD" synthesis, diamond growth occurs on a seed during carbon deposition mainly from a gaseous medium at relatively low temperatures and pressures.
Jewelry and precious stones are just such a category of goods, when buying which you need to pay attention to many criteria.
Sogdianite is a rather rare mineral and more often it can be found as a collection material (moreover, in systematic collections), and it is extremely rare in jewelry.