 We have found the most pure form of the hexagonal lonstolate phase of diamond that's ever been discovered. What's more, we've found it in a nanocrystalline form, which means that it could be even stronger than the bulk form. What's really interesting about this material is that it's predicted to be harder than regular diamonds. Regular diamonds are cubic. These diamonds are hexagonal, so they have a different structure. The atoms are arranged in slightly different ways, and that gives them different properties. It was a really fortuitous find. We thought the experiment had failed, the diamond had broken. I noticed something different. This something was a little shoulder on the side of a peak, and it didn't mean all that much until we examined it later on in Melbourne and in Canberra, when we realised it was something very, very different. We almost missed the finding that we had this new hexagonal form of carbon. So how we made this material in the lab was using this little device. It's called a diamond anvil cell, two diamonds opposing each other and applying super high pressures. In fact, the pressures that you get down deep inside the earth. Previously, this has only been found in impact craters, the Canyon Diablo in Arizona, but we've been able to synthesise it in the lab at really low temperatures for the first time. Some of the applications of this work, of course, would be any time you want a super hard material. If you're trying to cut something, that's where a lot of the uses of diamonds are in industry. So of course, if we can have an even harder diamond, then it's a lot more efficient in terms of cutting. This is not going to be a diamond that you're going to wear on an engagement ring. The applications for this are much more in terms of a mining site, but I still think diamonds are a scientist's best friend.