Many of the valuable materials including gems and oil are produced at the extreme conditions of pressure and temperature deep within the earth.

Many of these are then meta-stable compounds which can keep their compositions in ambient conditions. Advances in high pressure techniques allow synthesizing materials in such conditions in tabletop experiments.

High-pressure synthesis inside a diamond anvil cell is a powerful method that can be utilized to synthesize materials which may need high pressure for synthesis but afterward may be stable even in ambient conditions. This method yields small quantities which are sufficient for preliminary studies and help in the discovery of interesting compounds. In addition, even small quantities of a valuable material may be sufficient as a seed for growing large single crystals. In our lab we are exploring the possibilities for synthesis of materials with novel properties at high pressure.