Create synthetic diamonds that help find life on another planet

The new invention could create an explosion in the technology industry such as shooting movies in the hospital, airport security scanners, or even looking for life on another planet.

For the first time, researchers used diamonds to create maser (amplified by microwave emission by stimulated emission) in solid state and can operate continuously in room temperature.

Maser is like a microwave version of a laser. While the laser emits a powerful light ray, the maser emits concentrated microwave rays. Maser was invented before lasers, and has been used in many things such as atomic clocks, radio telescopes, and spacecraft communication.

However, it is not easy to create a solid state maser. Scientists set them up by amplifying microwaves through a crystal, such as ruby. They also require special conditions such as strong magnetic fields and absolute zero temperature (-273 degrees Celsius). Our current technology is very limited to be able to apply and create solid state maser.

Diamonds can operate at room temperature.(Photo: ICL).

And to overcome this, researchers at the Royal College of London (ICL) and the University of London used a diamond developed in the laboratory as an amplified crystal. Thus, for the first time, they created a solid-state maser that could work continuously.

This project was built based on research by ICL and the UK National Physics Laboratory in 2012. At that time, researchers created maser in solid state using p-Terphenyl doped crystals with pentacene organic semiconductors - they act as amplifiers. This maser can operate at room temperature and does not require the use of magnets. But they only run for a few milliseconds - even if it can work continuously, the crystal will melt.

With this new system, the researchers replaced the old crystal with a synthetic diamond developed under nitrogen-rich conditions. A high-energy electron beam is used to "kick" carbon atoms away from the diamond, creating gaps in its grid structure.

The researchers heated the diamond then created carbon spaces to bind to the nitrogen atoms. From there, they created a vacant-nitrogen center, rotating electrons that could be controlled by magnetic fields, electric fields or microwaves inside the center.

When placed inside a sapphire ring to focus on microwave energy and illuminate with blue lasers, scientists found maser to work efficiently. Not only can they operate at room temperature, they can also run continuously.

Maser is illuminated by blue laser light.(Photo: ICL).

Researcher Neil Alford, co-author of the Royal College of London study, said: "This technology may have many applications, but the most obvious path I see here is that it is very effective. for use in areas where sensitive microwave rays are needed ".

In addition to shooting movies and airport scanners, researchers believe that maser technology can be used for other sensitive applications such as bomb detection, quantum computers, and even searching. search for life on other planets.

Leading researcher Jonathan Breeze said: "This breakthrough paved the way for widespread use of maser in many areas and they will play an important role in creating devices to discover things that communes Assembly is interested ".

The description of maser has been published in Nature.