Scientists create 'diamond rain' to study frozen planets like Uranus

Scientists in the US have created "diamond precipitation" in a laboratory in order to mimic the conditions of frozen planets like Uranus and Neptune, according to a report from Nature Astronomy.

These icy giants are believed to contain large amounts of hydrocarbons such as methane, the report says, which "undergo structural transitions" due to high temperatures and pressures near the core of the planets – forming diamonds.

The experiments were undertaken at the SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory in California, says Business Insider, where scientists mimicked planetary conditions by creating two shockwaves in polystyrene to generate extreme temperatures.

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The shockwaves heat the polystyrene to "around 5,000 Kelvin" (4,727 degrees Celsius), the website says, simulating the atmosphere on frozen planets and generating the conditions needed for diamond rain.

While polystyrene isn't present on these icy planets, the site says it's a "suitable chemical stand-in for the compounds formed from methane".

But Quartz says the diamonds fabricated in the lab were "less than one nanometer (a billionth of a meter) in length".

This would make them invisible to the naked eye. They can only be seen using "lab-grade electron microscopes", the website says.

The experiments will help scientists understand the atmospheres of distant planets, says the Daily Telegraph, but they also serve another purpose. The microscopic diamonds created through the tests could "potentially be harvested to make the tips of precision medical instruments or electronics."