What a lab looks for in a Neelam
- Heating: the gemmologist examines the silk, those fine needles, and the crystal inclusions. Heat dissolves silk and changes inclusions, often leaving small tell-tale halos.
- Diffusion: beryllium or titanium driven into the surface to add colour. This needs advanced instruments to detect.
- Glass filling: cracks filled with lead glass, which under magnification show flashes of colour and trapped gas bubbles.
- Synthetics: flame-fusion stones show curved growth lines and round bubbles, and flux-grown stones carry traces of flux.
Some labs will also give an opinion on where a sapphire was mined.
Getting a report
Choose a stone from our blue sapphire collection and message us its link on WhatsApp. We'll explain how testing would work for that particular stone, and you see the report before you pay. The same goes for yellow sapphire, purple sapphire and tanzanite. Our page on lab-certified gemstones has the wider picture.
References
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