Wednesday, September 10, 2008

Sapphire Stones

Sapphire refers to gem varieties of the stone corundum, an aluminium oxide (Al2O3), when it is a color other than red. Sapphire can be found unsurprisingly or manufactured in large crystal boules. Because of its amazing hardness sapphire is used in many applications, including infrared optical components, watch crystals, high-durability windows, and wafers for the deposition of semiconductors, such as GaN nanorods.

The mineral corundum consists of clean aluminium oxide. Trace amounts of other elements such as iron, titanium and chromium provide corundum their blue, yellow, pink, purple, orange or greenish color. Sapphire includes any gemstone quality varieties of the mineral corundum apart from fully saturated red variety, which is instead known as ruby, and the pinkish-orange variety known as padparadscha.

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