What Exactly is Moissanite?

Since I am all about disambiguation I thought that I would share what I have learned about Moissanite through the JVC (Jewelers Vigilance Committee) and Charles & Colvard, Ltd.

For the visual learners in the crowd:

The above video was created by the JVC with Charles & Colvard, Ltd. to help all of us better understand what Moissanite is and where it fits within our industry. 

For the more cerebral types:

"Moissanite or silicon carbide (SiC) is a rare mineral that can be found in meteorites and in terrestrial samples. It belongs to the carbon group and because of its similarity to diamonds it is used as a replacement for diamonds in fashion and in science applications. 

"Moissanite was discovered by Dr. Ferdinand Frederick Henri Moissan, a French chemist best known for his Nobel Prize winning procedure on the isolation of fluorine in 1886. He discovered moissanite while examining rock samples from a meteor crater located in Canyon Diablo, Arizona. He later identified this new mineral and called it silicon carbide (Xu J. and Mao H., 2000). Silicon carbide was named moissanite in honor of Dr. Moissan later on in his life (Di Pierro et al., 2003)." (Source) 

Hopefully you have gleaned something from this little service announcement of sorts and perhaps it will even better help you meet your specific customers’ needs. 

If you would like to learn more about Moissanite I would encourage you to click here.