All of the peer-reviewed research on diamonds, colored stones and pearls presented in Gems & Gemology (G&G), the leading journal in its field, is now available, for free, on the iPad. The new G&G app complements GIA’s (Gemological Institute of America) award-winning quarterly journal with enhanced digital content and is downloadable for free on iTunes.

When it’s time to buy a diamond, many people spend a lot of time educating themselves on the 4Cs of diamond quality, and then determining what the personal trade-offs between those various quality characteristics will be.

GIA will be included in a story about modern-day treasure hunting this Sunday, April 22, at 7 p.m. on CBS’s 60 Minutes, the long-running weekly news program. 

Zultanite is an extremely rare gemstone used in jewelry design, and was a popular choice at the 2011 Couture conference, which features the most unique, innovative and inventive jewelry design. Famous jewelry designers such as Stephen Webster, Erica Courtney and Rhonda Faber Green all incorporated zultanite into their collections. Zultanite changes color in light, ranging from a kiwi green with flashes of yellow in sunlight conditions to raspberry hues in candlelight.

We know it’s shocking that 2011 is half over, but the jewelry trends made popular this spring are expected to continue into next Spring 2012. Here is a round up of GIA’s favorite jewelry style buzz we’ve seen throughout the first half of 2011:

From the Victorian and Art Deco eras to the present time, all that was old is new once more – at least when exploring historic trend-setting jewelry styles of the early 19th and 20th centuries. Current jewelry designs often reflect the same gems, shapes and motifs of bygone eras.