The Galaxy's Largest Diamond

[Township75]

Cambridge, MA -- When choosing a Valentine's Day gift for a wife or girlfriend, you can't go wrong with diamonds. If you really want to impress your favorite lady this Valentine's Day, get her the galaxy's largest diamond. But you'd better carry a deep wallet, because this 10 billion trillion trillion carat monster has a cost that's literally astronomical!

"You would need a jeweler's loupe the size of the Sun to grade this diamond!" says astronomer Travis Metcalfe (Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics), who leads a team of researchers that discovered the giant gem. "Bill Gates and Donald Trump together couldn't begin to afford it."

When asked to estimate the value of the cosmic jewel, Ronald Winston, CEO of Harry Winston Inc., indicated that such a large diamond probably would depress the value of the market, stating, "Who knows? It may be a self-deflating prophecy because there is so much of it." He added, "It is definitely too big to wear!"

The newly discovered cosmic diamond is a chunk of crystallized carbon 50 light-years from the Earth in the constellation Centaurus. (A light-year is the distance light travels in a year, or about 6 trillion miles.) It is 2,500 miles across and weighs 5 million trillion trillion pounds, which translates to approximately 10 billion trillion trillion carats, or a one followed by 34 zeros.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2004/02/040214080728.htm

[Kamika]

1. You know what's pretty fascinating?

3 billion years ago that hunk of diamond might have been warming a civilization far greater then ours.

Talk about feeling insignificant

[TheMightyFavog]

2. In a related story...

Liz Taylor is prepearing a specail expediton to retrieve this giant diamond.

[pansypoo53219]

3. fooey

man does debyrs have the world conned.

[Ready4Change]

4. Gravity?

Anyone have any idea what gravitation forces would be present on the surface of that? Temperatures?

[Deja Q]

5. Why do we condition ourselves to treasure and wear rocks?

Especially when their industrial and practical purposes have more significance?

Okay, I am a hypocrite. I do wear a pinky mood ring that change color depending on my skin temperature. It's composed of minerals, best suited to something practical. But it had cost $2, not $200. So I'm only 1/100th as guilty... :D :eyes:

[Township75]

6. Well...I guess I look at this kind of stuff very differently...

seems most people saw this and responded about greed and value.

When I saw this I thought about the types of conditions needed to induce the process created that. I never thought about it in terms of worth, or who would want it, or about diamond mines on Earth. Just thought about the the science.

[Heyo]

7. Im surprised there is...

..that much carbon so tightly squeezed in one place.. maybe it's an old part of a shattered planet.

Heyo