In addition, nine radioactive isotopes of erbium are recognized. Most of the rare-earth oxides have sharp absorption bands in the visible, ultraviolet, and near infrared. This property, associated with the electronic structure, gives beautiful pastel colors to many of the rare-earth salts. Erbium occurs in a variety of minerals, including gadolinite, euxenite, xenotime, fergusonite, polycrase and blomstrandine. Erbium is finding uses in nuclear and metallurgical applications. When added to vanadium , erbium lowers the hardness and improves pliability of the metal.
Erbium oxide adds a pink hue to glasses and porcelain enamel glazes. Their location makes them remarkably insensitive to the world outside - which is why the colours are so consistent from compound to compound.
But what Bunsen could not know, was that there were spectroscopic bands in the infrared part of the spectrum and it is these that are what makes erbium so valuable to us today. As you are probably aware, most of our telephone calls and internet data transfers are carried by optical fibres.
These gossamer thin threads of glass are of a rare optical perfection. But much like light passing through the atmosphere, scattering occurs - photons of light collide occasionally with the chains of glass in the fibre and the light is attenuated, limiting the length of fibre one can use.
This phenomenon, called Rayleigh scattering, is the same that causes the daytime sky to be blue and sunsets to be red. The shorter the wavelength, the greater the scattering. Erbium light - at 1. Erbium lasers and amplifiers are therefore the hub around which all of our modern telecommunications revolve. So the next time you phone a friend and say to them "It's a lovely day.
Let's go to the park", think Erbium. It may only be the 44 th most abundant element on our planet. But it punches far above its weight.
How ironic that the man who invented the Bunsen burner ended up with his work going up in smoke thanks to the sun. Next time to the philosopher's stone and the man who boiled up urine expecting to get gold, and found this element instead. Phosphorus was first made by Hennig Brandt in Hamburg in Germany in when he evaporated urine and heated the residue until it was red hot.
Glowing phosphorus vapour came off and he condensed it under water. And for more than years most phosphorus was made this way. This was until people realised that bone was a great source of phosphorus. Bone can be dissolved in sulfuric acid to form phosphoric acid, which is then heated with charcoal to form white phosphorus. But what can we do with it? You can find out next time when Nina Notman tells the tale of Phosphorous on next week's Chemistry in its Element, I hope you can join us.
I'm Chris Smith, thank you for listening and goodbye. Chemistry in its element is brought to you by the Royal Society of Chemistry and produced by thenakedscientists. There's more information and other episodes of Chemistry in its element on our website at chemistryworld. Click here to view videos about Erbium.
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Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Youtube. Discovery date. Discovered by. Carl Gustav Mosander. Origin of the name. Erbium is named after Ytterby, Sweden,. Melting point. Boiling point. Atomic number. Relative atomic mass. Key isotopes. Electron configuration. CAS number. ChemSpider ID. ChemSpider is a free chemical structure database. Electronegativity Pauling scale. Common oxidation states. Atomic mass. Half life.
Mode of decay. Relative supply risk. Crustal abundance ppm. Top 3 producers. Top 3 reserve holders. Russia 3 USA. Political stability of top producer.
Political stability of top reserve holder. Young's modulus GPa. Shear modulus GPa. Erbium metal has a bright, shiny surface, much like metallic silver. It is soft and malleable. Malleable means capable of being hammered into thin sheets. Its density is 9. Erbium is fairly stable in air. It does not react with oxygen as quickly as most other lanthanides.
Erbium compounds tend to be pink or red. They are sometimes used to color glass and ceramics. An important use of erbium is in lasers. Here, a patient undergoes cosmetic laser surgery. Erbium ranks about number 42 in abundance in the Earth's crust. It is more common than bromine, uranium, tin, silver and mercury. It occurs in many different rare earth minerals, naturally occurring lanthanide mixtures. Some common sources of erbium are xenotime, fergusonite, gadolinite, and euxenite.
Six naturally occurring isotopes of erbium are known. Isotopes are two or more forms of an element. Isotopes differ from each other according to their mass number. The number written to the right of the element's name is the mass number.
The mass number represents the number of protons plus neutrons in the nucleus of an atom of the element. The number of protons determines the element, but the number of neutrons in the atom of any one element can vary. Each variation is an isotope. The isotopes of erbium are erbium, erbium, erbium, erbium, erbium, and erbium Four elements are named after the small town of Ytterby, Sweden: erbium, terbium, yttrium, and ytterbium.
At least thirteen radioactive isotopes of erbium are known also. A radioactive isotope is one that breaks apart and gives off some form of radiation. Radioactive isotopes are produced when very small particles, such as protons or neutrons, are Erbium is used in optical fibers, very thin pieces of glass or plastic used in the communications industry.
These particles stick in the atoms and make them radioactive. None of the radioactive isotopes of erbium has any important uses. Erbium in a mineral is first converted into erbium fluoride ErF 3.
Pure erbium is then obtained by passing an electric current through erbium fluoride:. Erbium metal has few uses. It is sometimes alloyed with vanadium metal.
An alloy is made by melting and mixing two or more metals. The mixture has properties different than those of the individual metals.
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