Ideas Crystal clear A Northeastern professor says his shuttle mission opened his eyes to the value of laboratories in space. In isolated chambers deep within the earth, under intense pressure and heat, carbon can sometimes form into a crystal so pure that we consider it a symbol of perfection. The value we place on diamonds is an indication of the rarity of crystalline perfection on this planet. Although carbon, silicon, and other minerals start out their microscopic mineral lives with clean, sharp atomic structures, they almost always deform as they grow, stunted by gravity, buffeted by convection, crimped by neighboring geology.
Earth is a messy laboratory for minerals.
It's different in space. In space, crystals can grow unfettered. Free from the influence of gravity, secure in a vacuum, their geometric lattices can deploy slowly and elegantly, building into large-scale echoes of the underlying atomic structure. For almost 20 years, astronauts have been experimenting with crystal growth in microgravity. Sacco believes in space.