What Causes Color in Diamonds?
Diamonds are carbon essentially, but most diamonds will have trace impurities that create color. For example, nitrogen impurities cause yellow color. Nitrogen is the most common impurity in diamond, so the majority of diamonds you’ll see in the marketplace will have varying degrees of yellow tint. Brown color in diamond is thought to be caused by internal graining, which results from structural irregularites often in combination with an impurity like nitrogen. Colorless diamonds are very rare, as they contain little to no impurities and are essentially chemically pure. *Stay tuned for our Fancy Color tutorial, where we will discuss cause of color in depth.
