Intrinsic to its name, the Hope Diamond has opened possibilities for scientists to conduct research in diamonds. The 45.52-carat blue Hope Diamond is known to glows red-orange when exposed to ultraviolet light. A team of researchers from the US Naval Research Laboratory, the Smithsonian Institution and Penn State, said that the red phosphorescence was due to high levels of boron and low levels of nitrogen impurities in natural blue diamonds, and the interaction of these two elements.%%This very property has enabled scientists to track natural blue diamonds from synthetics, according to the Associated Press reports. Jeffrey Port, the curator of the National Gem Collection at the Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History, where the Hope Diamond is displayed mentioned that scientists have been able to separate natural blue diamonds from artificial ones and from those which are real ones but ‘enhanced’ in laboratories.
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