Scientists duplicated the diamond-raining phenomenon on Uranus and Neptune.

A worldwide team of scientists replicated the "diamond rain" believed to exist in Uranus and Neptune. Greg Stewart/SLAC

It's possible that Neptune and Uranus, two giant ice planets, provide the ideal circumstances for a diamond rain. Since we can't physically visit these places to verify, we must rely on artificial atmospheres created in a lab. To test how rapidly and readily diamonds may grow in such conditions, a group of physicists utilized a vaporized form of common polymers.

The idea of diamond rain sounds entire, yet it may work. Uranus and Neptune, the ice giants of our solar system, have the ideal pressures and temperatures for this process to occur in their upper atmospheres. Diamonds result from carbon atoms sticking together in the atmosphere's middle layers. When the diamonds have grown large enough, they will fall to Earth's surface. Overheated to the point where solidity is impossible, they sublimate back into gaseous carbon atoms and rise to the surface once more.

Similar to Earth's water cycle, except with carbon and diamonds instead of water vapor and precipitation.

Unfortunately, we lack the technology to probe the atmosphere of these planets; therefore, the only method to determine whether or not these worlds rain diamonds is to attempt to duplicate the atmospheric conditions of those planets in a laboratory setting. Recently, a group of scientists succeeded in creating diamonds on the nanoscale scale in the lab, but their findings were constrained by the fact that they only worked with carbon and hydrogen.

Now, a group from the United States has The presence of oxygen, which is plentiful in the atmospheres of the ice giants, was factored in by researchers at the Department of Energy's SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory.

According to Siegfried Glanzer, head of SLAC's High Energy Density Division, "the earlier work was the first time that we directly saw diamond creation from any mixes." Experiments with many pure materials have been conducted since then. However, the situation is significantly more intricate within planets due to the many molecules involved. So, the purpose of this study was to investigate the impact of these new compounds.

You may remember PET plastic as a typical material for food containers and bottles was used to create the desired environment. "PET provides a nice balance between carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen to imitate the activity on ice worlds," said Dominik Kraus, a physicist at HZDR and professor at the University of Rostock.

Researchers discovered that oxygen increased the rate at which diamonds formed and simplified the process by which they did so. According to Kraus, "the effect of the oxygen was to speed the splitting of the carbon and hydrogen," which favored the creation of nanodiamonds. As a result, "carbon atoms could unite more readily to make diamonds."

It's not a replica of the ice giant's atmosphere, but it's a significant improvement over earlier attempts. That diamonds are indeed growing on those planets is hinted at by this discovery.

During their investigation, the scientists only succeeded in growing diamonds for a brief moment. Diamonds, however, would have an infinite amount of time to develop in the environments of Uranus and Neptune. Researchers claim that diamonds growing in Uranus and Neptune could weigh as much as a million carrots each.

Now you know where to look for some shiny new jewelry.