In what has been described as a world first, Chinese scientists have created a 3-carat diamond exclusively out of carbon elements derived from red peonies.

The world’s first diamond made from peony-derived carbon elements was unveiled today in Luoyang, China’s Henan Province. It was donated to the Luoyang National Peony Garden by Luoyang Time Promise Co., a company that specializes in artificial diamonds. At the end of last month, the city’s peony garden agreed to supply the diamond company with the peonies necessary to create the unique diamond, including a nearly 50-year-old peony.

Photo: Wim Hovens/Unsplash

“The diamond is valued at 300,000 yuan. It is cultivated from peonies using our biogenic carbon extraction technology, subjected to high temperature and pressure, and then cultivated,” said Wang Jing, CEO of Luoyang Time Promise Co.

Although the technology used to turn peony-derived carbon elements into diamonds is a fairly complex one, the Chinese company revealed that carbon elements from various sources (hair, bones, and even flowers) are extracted in a specially designed device that breaks the chemical bonds between the extracted carbon atoms. Then, those elements are recombined into a diamond structure and the actual diamond is formed.