A pinkish orange variety of sapphire is called padparadscha. Although blue is the best-known sapphire color, they occur in other colors, including gray and black, and also can be colorless. Sapphire is one of the two gem-varieties of corundum, the other being ruby (defined as corundum in a shade of red). Natural sapphires Īn uncut, rough yellow sapphire found at the Spokane Sapphire Mine near Helena, Montana A sapphire jubilee occurs after 65 years. Sapphire is the birthstone for September and the gem of the 45th anniversary. Because of the remarkable hardness of sapphires – 9 on the Mohs scale (the third hardest mineral, after diamond at 10 and moissanite at 9.5) – sapphires are also used in some non-ornamental applications, such as infrared optical components, high-durability windows, wristwatch crystals and movement bearings, and very thin electronic wafers, which are used as the insulating substrates of special-purpose solid-state electronics such as integrated circuits and GaN-based blue LEDs. They also may be created synthetically in laboratories for industrial or decorative purposes in large crystal boules. Commonly, natural sapphires are cut and polished into gemstones and worn in jewelry. Pink-colored corundum may be classified either as ruby or sapphire depending on locale. Red corundum stones also occur, but are called rubies rather than sapphires. It is typically blue, but natural 'fancy' sapphires also occur in yellow, purple, orange, and green colors 'parti sapphires' show two or more colors. The name sapphire is derived via the Latin 'sapphirus' from the Greek 'sappheiros', which referred to lapis lazuli. Sapphire is a precious gemstone, a variety of the mineral corundum, consisting of aluminium oxide ( α- Al 2 O 3) with trace amounts of elements such as iron, titanium, chromium, vanadium, or magnesium.

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