How Diamonds and Light Measure Immense Pressure ⚡ экспресс
Researchers turned nanodiamonds into quantum sensors to capture, for the first time, a wide-angle optical snapshot of pressure distribution inside a diamond anvil cell at ~20 GPa. Each nanodiamond, like a miniature compass, registers stress, and its glow (optically detected magnetic resonance) reveals the exact magnitude and type of load. The maps highlight where pressure is uniform and where it gets skewed—and even show how the method of introducing the sensors influences this unevenness. The technique isn't just for pressure; it works for magnetic fields too, promising to revolutionize high-pressure materials science.
Inside a diamond anvil cell—a chamber where two diamond pyramids crush a tiny droplet of liquid with forces generating pressures as high as at Earth's center—scientists sprinkled diamond dust of carbon. Each virus-sized grain, under a laser beam, began to glow like a microscopic lightbulb, and its light changed depending on how strongly the surrounding liquid was compressed: higher pressure shifted the color and increased brightness.
Collecting light from millions of these twinkling particles and analyzing it using spectroscopy (splitting it into a spectrum) and photometry (measuring brightness), researchers for the first time saw not just an average number but a vivid landscape of unevenness. Pressure spread in patches, like a heat map: they discovered 'hot spots' where compression was significantly higher, threatening the sample's integrity. Previously, such anomalies could only be guessed at.
In the future, this method will not only control high-pressure experiments but also study magnetic fields or model the interiors of distant planets. A striking fact: diamond dust specks, withstanding a monstrous 200,000 atmospheres (at which steel flows like water), act as ideal, indestructible sensors. They register pressure fluctuations of just a few tens of atmospheres, remaining stable beacons in this extreme hell.
🎯 A pressure of 20 gigapascals (roughly 200,000 atmospheres) can turn soft graphite into diamond—exactly the conditions created in diamond anvil cells.