It’s amazing how one element in the periodic table is found in so many different kinds of stuff in our world. And, yet, despite its importance, it’s a rarity compared with ordinary hydrogen, the most abundant ingredient in water, most stars and the universe in general. So, already you can see this one isotope’s importance in astronomy, pharmaceuticals and energy.
(Alas, no prize for NIST’s Ferdinand Brickwedde. It was discovered in the 1930s at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST, then known as the National Bureau of Standards), where it was identified by Harold Urey of Columbia University, who won a Nobel Prize for the feat. The deuterium isotope helps create heavier elements inside stars, makes certain drugs more effective, and could be the key ingredient for making clean fusion energy. For example, hydrogen usually only has one proton and no neutrons, but an isotope known as deuterium or “heavy hydrogen” also contains one neutron. If there are fewer or more electrons than protons, the atom is electrically charged and known as an ion.Įach atom can have several different versions, known as isotopes, in which there are different numbers of neutrons in the nucleus. If there are an equal number of electrons and protons, the atom is electrically neutral. Hydrogen has one proton, so its atomic number is 1, and uranium has 92, so its atomic number is … 92. The one feature that defines an atomic element is its atomic number, that is, the number of protons it has in its nucleus. Zooming in on the nucleus a little more, we find positively charged particles known as protons and neutral particles known as neutrons. Each of these building blocks, known as atomic elements, contains a positively charged core (known as the nucleus) that is (usually) surrounded by a cloud of negatively charged particles called electrons. To date, humans have observed 118, both natural and artificially made. It’s a chart of all the chemical building blocks of matter.
It’s also about mathematics and engineering and even nonscientific areas of knowledge including history, geography and the origins of words.įirst, a quick review of what the periodic table is.
This is the International Year of the Periodic Table, and while I’ve been (accurately) accused of being a physics fanboy, I’m here to tell you that this famous chart isn’t just about physics, chemistry and the other sciences.
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