Some allotropes have even greater density than diamond!
A scientific breakthrough in physics has just occurred. Scientists at the University de Oviedo in Spain have discovered three hitherto unknown forms of carbon that are denser than diamond. The material forms of carbon range from super-soft graphite used in lead pencils all the way to the hardcore diamond with which you can cut glass. But now more additions to the carbon family are on the way.
Three scientists along with their colleagues have proposed three new forms that are 3% harder than diamond. Until now diamond was the king pin. When doped with other trace elements diamond displayed properties of superconductivity. The research is still in its infancy but if these allotropes could be grown on substrates or created by shock squeezing of low-density modifications than we might be on to new structure materials with a host of possible uses.
Life as we all know is carbon-based (from an incomplete and strictly chemical point of view). And of the two main branches of inorganic and organic chemistry the latter studies carbon compounds and their derivatives.