US2004/0069209 A1 discloses such a method and such a diamond layer. In this known method, a metal oxide substrate is provided with an iridium layer. Diamond from the gas phase is deposited in a CVD process on the surface of the iridium layer.
However, a drawback of this known method is the lattice mismatch between diamond and iridium of about 7.1%. This merely serves for producing a nanocrystalline diamond layer having many defects. Therefore, such diamond layers cannot be used as a starting material for electronic components.