Maureen Collier, age ll, of Victoria BC Canada, for her question:

What is a diamond made of?

Puny people plum refuse to believe that a rare and precious diamond is made from a very common and plentiful material. Even some of Andy's avid readers find this fact hard to believe. But it is true. A diamond is made from carbon, and carbon is the l4th most plentiful element of the earth's crust.

An element is made of atoms of one kind. But these atoms can arrange themselves in different patterns. The same atoms may form very different looking solids merely because they are arranged in different patterns. Carbon atoms may form dusky soot or the soft graphite in a so called lead pencil. Crystallized together in a different pattern the same carbon atoms can form a transparent and sparkling diamond.