Only if the gem is recut will the fingerprint change, and even then experts say the print will be similar enough to permit identification. At the moment, it is difficult positively to identify a gem because so many stones are alike.. The certificate will also help insurers prevent fraud by allowing them to identify stones which are recovered. A similar but less sophisticated machine has been in operation in North America for about 10 years.Diamond owners will keep a certificate of the fingerprint, which looks like a cluster of dots, to identify the stone if it is stolen. A spokesman said that if it successfully completed tests, it would help improve consumer confidence. Customers can then put stones through the machine at a cost of about pounds 20 and repeat the process to check that they have not been switched.De Beers, the diamond dealer, said that it was “keeping a close eye” on Gemprint.

Officers in the Art and Antiques Squad, which deals with jewellery thefts, are hoping that the device will lead to an improvement in the recovery rate of stolen gems from the current rate of under 1 per cent, compared with a 60-70 per cent success rate for stolen vehicles. There are estimated to be pounds 600- pounds 800m worth of jewel thefts a year in Britain.Gemprint is also designed to stop a rare practice known as “growing a diamond”, whereby jewellers replace a gem during cleaning or resetting with an inferior-quality and lower-value diamond.The plan is for jewellers to lease the Gemprint, which also provides computer evaluations, at a token rate. “Our problem is matching stones which turn up with stones that have been reported stolen.”Scotland Yard is examining the Gemprint machine closely. The Gemprint device, which fires a laser beam through the diamond to create unique internal reflections, goes on the market in Britain later this year.
The London-based Art Loss Register, which scans catalogues, salerooms and auctions on the look-out for stolen gems, is testing the machine.”Unless you mark a stone in some way, there’s no way of telling if it’s yours or not when you’ve lost it,” said a spokesman for the register, now tracing 6,000 stolen pieces of jewellery. DIAMONDS and other gems are to be “fingerprinted” to prevent thefts and fraudulent insurance claims with the development of a machine producing a unique imprint of a precious stone, writes Marie Woolf.

Even if the animals are a bit strange I think we’ll just do it,” a spokesman said. “We’ll send them all the stuff and say that ‘you are the proud owner of an animal’ I hope they will take it in good heart If they don’t they haven’t got a sense of humour.”. It’s the main preoccupation in the House at the moment, finding animal- like qualities for MPs,” he said.Nobody, however, has owned up to pairing Lady Olga Maitland and a narrow hatchetfish; Jacques Arnold, Tory MP for Gravesham, with a Malagassy hissing cockroach; and Sir George Gardiner, the Euro-sceptic MP, with a lappet- faced vulture.Fishy matches also include Phillip Oppenheim, Conservative MP for Amber Valley, with a bony-lipped barb; David Alton, the Catholic Liberal Democrat,with a bleeding heart tetra; and Hugh Dykes, Tory MP for Harrow East, with a shovelnose sturgeon.London Zoo was bemused by the MPs’ choices but does not intend to alter its scheme as a result.”For all our adopters we have a plaque next to the species We’ll probably do a special one for MPs. Aiming to raise its parliamentary profile, the zoo offered MPs the privilege free, suggesting, by way of example, a lion for Mr Major, a hamster for Michael Heseltine, and a penguin for Mr Portillo.But no one thinks MPs are strange animals more than MPs do, and the scheme has led to some surprising pairings of members with mammals, birds, insects, reptiles and fish.Fish, indeed, for Mr Portillo, the Secretary of State for Employment, who is to adopt a thick-lipped grey mullet, courtesy of an anonymous Labour MP.Ann Widdecombe, the forceful Employment minister, has been given a vulturine guinea-fowl; Robin Cook, the ginger-haired shadow Foreign Secretary, a red-whiskered bulbul (an African bird); and David Shaw, Conservative MP for Dover and a frequent thorn in Labour’s side, an African dung beetle.The name of the sharply spoken and sharply dressed Teresa Gorman will adorn the home of the jewel wasp; that of Ray Powell, the senior Welsh Labour backbencher, that of a fat-tailed scorpion; and Peter Mandelson, Labour’s former spin doctor, will be seen inscribed beside the abode of a smooth snake.Most adoption nominations so far have been anonymous, but Paul Flynn, Labour MP for Newport West, admits that he adopted a red spitting cobra for Dennis Skinner “Everyone is sitting around filling in their forms.