Editor’s Note
This article explores the rise of lab-grown diamonds, which are now a significant industry. While their use in affordable jewelry is expanding, the focus is shifting to their industrial applications, with companies developing products that leverage diamonds’ unique properties beyond mere gemstones.
Diamonds can be manufactured in factories. In recent years, this has become an established industry, and while the market for artificial diamonds is expanding, prices have also begun to drop significantly. Japanese venture companies are focusing on the ultimate properties of diamonds and rushing to develop products that go beyond just gemstones.
The proportion of “artificial” diamonds circulating as gemstones is increasing. Not only are affordable, large gemstones available, but because no mining is involved, they avoid issues associated with natural diamonds such as deforestation and forced labor, drawing attention from an SDGs perspective as well.
Among artificial diamonds, those created for gemstone use are also called “Lab-Grown Diamonds (LGD)”, meaning grown in a laboratory.
EDP was founded in 2009, with technology born at the National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology (AIST) at its core. Its strength lies in its ability to produce large “single-crystal” diamonds, where carbon atoms are arranged in a regular pattern, rather than “polycrystalline” diamonds composed of many aggregated grains.
There are two main methods for creating artificial diamonds. One method crystallizes raw carbon under high temperature and high pressure, similar to the deep underground conditions where natural diamonds form. The other is the “vapor-phase synthesis method,” which creates diamonds from gas under high temperature and low pressure. Currently, the vapor-phase synthesis method is mainstream, and EDP has also introduced many of these systems.
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