Word: gem
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...Brezzi, noting the importance of the True Cross restoration in drawing visitors. "But like all of Italy really, this remains a small town no matter how big it might get." With its medieval architecture and steep cobblestone streets, the city of 97,000 is in fact a midsize cultural gem that sometimes gets lost in the shadow of Florence to the north and Siena to the west. It was the hometown of the Roberto Benigni character in the Oscar-winning Life is Beautiful, while Guido d'Arezzo, credited with inventing modern musical notation, was born here in the year...
...MacFarlane says. Asked to predict last week’s Academy Awards, he answers, “Is ‘Cool Runnings’ up for anything this year?” But “The Winner” may fade from memory sooner than that cinematic gem. The first six episodes are already on iTunes, weeks before they’ll ever air. The reviews have been decidedly mixed...
...Apollo, Element Six and most of the other leading diamondmakers are relying on a process called chemical vapor deposition (CVD). It's a low-pressure, high-temperature method that uses heat energy from plasma and a combination of gases to rain carbon atoms on a starter seed of the gem, which gradually grows into a larger single-crystal diamond. CVD produces a more uniform, consistent diamond in sizes large enough to make an effective transistor. Using the diamond it created in its reactors as a "mother seed," Apollo Diamond can now grow wafers that are large enough...
Also tracking the progress of diamondmaking are biologists, who covet the gem's inertness--it doesn't react with other substances--and its ability to retain its structural integrity despite being bathed in natural acids and other organic compounds. One possible application: diamond-based electrodes, implanted under the skin, that could be designed to react chemically in the presence of certain proteins. Already, researchers at Case Western Reserve University have developed such a prototype for detecting levels of a protein critical to nerve-cell activity...
Since it may be another decade before such medical applications of diamond become a reality, for now Apollo is using the same CVD process to produce gem-quality stones for the retail market. Just last year the company started selling rough-cut gems to a Boston jewelry retailer. It may prove to be a smart strategy until the industrial market matures; thanks to booming economies in China and India, retail sales of diamond jewelry have been surging for a decade. Analysts expect up to 20% annual growth in the diamond market in China alone. With current mine capacities, that translates...