Diamonds are the strongest material on Earth, but an even stronger type of diamond has been created in the lab. Hexagonal diamonds are stiffer and stronger than the typical cubic diamonds used for jewelry, according to WSU researchers. Both graphite and diamonds are made of carbon, and this allows graphite to be converted to diamond under extreme compression, said Yogendra Gupta, professor at the WSU Institute for Shock Physics and co-author in the study. To convert the graphite into diamond, a small graphite disk was accelerated through a two-stage gas gun, said lead author Travis Volz, who worked on the research during his doctoral work at WSU. Volz is now a researcher at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory.