July 22, 2010
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U of A loans out rough diamond collection to Royal Alberta Museum
A new exhibit at the Royal Alberta Museum has a unique connection to Edmonton, as the University of Alberta has contributed diamonds from its own Mineralogy and Petrology Museum to enhance the show while on display in the city.
“Diamonds,” a travelling exhibit originating from Ontario, offers the public the opportunity to explore not only exquisite and unique diamonds, but also learn about the science behind the mineral. Melissa Bowerman, assistant curator for the Royal Alberta Museum and a U of A graduate, said that the Royal Alberta Museum approached the U of A for additional materials as they wanted to “add a bit of sparkle” to the exhibit.
“This is the finest exhibit of rough diamonds you’ll be seeing in North America,” Bowerman said.
The public’s perception of the value of diamonds has led the exhibit to host extensive security.
“Diamonds have a certain mystique or allure,” Bowerman explained. According to Bowerman, this is one of the most secure shows the Royal Alberta Museum has seen in recent years.
Thomas Stachel, Professor of Geology at the U of A and the Canadian Research Chair in Diamonds, received a request from Bowerman to loan the University’s diamond display to the museum for this exhibit. The collection from the University was assembled with the intention of displaying a wide variety of properties of diamonds, including colour, crystal shapes, surface features, and inclusions. The display also contains a small section regarding industrial diamonds.
“The beauty of [the] collection does not lie in any individual piece," Stachel emphasized.
The average weight of a diamond loaned to the museum is one karat, or approximately 0.2 grams, although the extraordinary pink diamond from the U of A is approximately three karats. Vividly pink diamonds are extremely rare, as they originate from a single mine in Australia.
“For a while this was the biggest mine in the world in terms of mass, but now they are coming towards the end of their life. Once that is over, the supply of pink diamonds essentially will more or less end,” Stachel explained.
Diamonds tend to adopt colours based on chemicals present during their development: uranium often causes a green tinge, while the presence of nitrogen results in a yellow colouring. It often takes hundreds of millions of years for a diamond to inherit a colourful hue; a simple polishing can remove the colour completely, as it resides only in the top nanometres of the diamond’s upper layer.
“Diamonds” also features the famous Opdahl Diamond, the first verified diamond to be found in Alberta.
While the province does not yet have an official diamond mine, it does have numerous diamond deposits. The Opdahl Diamond was found in a river valley west of Edmonton in the 1950s.
Stachel began the formulation of the current diamond display at the University in 2001 with assistance from De Beers, the world’s largest diamond mining and trading company, as well as private donations.
“We did not want cut diamonds because that is shown in museums all around the world; we wanted them all rough so that you really see the properties of natural diamonds in most diamond exhibits when you go there you see beautiful cut stones. That too is valid, but it shows you something very different that is not what geology is about," Stachel explained.
The Museum of Mineralogy and Petrology draws approximately 5,000 visitors each year, and is a frequent attraction for school-aged children.
“In a way [this exhibit] raises the profile of the display, which then hopefully draws more visitors to our museum," he said.
“Diamonds” will run at the Royal Alberta Museum until March 21. The Museum of Mineralogy and Petrology is located in the basement of the Earth Sciences Building, and is open Monday through Friday to the public.
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