The difference between potassium and sodium was not discovered until the 18th century. "Vegetable alkali" also known as potassium carbonate came from the earth. "Mineral alkali" also known as sodium carbonate came from wood ashes. Early chemists did not recognise that these were two different chemical compounds.
Sir Humphry Davy discovered potassium in 1807 in England, by isolating it using electrolysis. Potassium was the first metal to be isolated by using electrolysis. The name potassium originated from the English word "potash" meaning pot ashes and the Arabic word "qali" meaning alkali. This was because potassium was originally obtained by soaking wood ashes in water and then evaporating the mixture in an iron pot. The origin of the elements symbol “K” comes from the Latin word "kalium" meaning potassium. Potassium used to be called kalium, so the element symbol is 'K'.
Potassium is an "Alkali Metal," and a solid element. Alkali Metals are very reactive metals that do not occur freely in nature. They are are soft, malleable, and good conductors of heat and electricity. It is the 19th element on the periodic table, and located in group 1, period 4.
Potassium is very reactive, and is never found free in nature. It is the eighth most abundant element on earth, and makes up about 2.1% of the earth's crust. Potassium is obtained from the minerals sylvite, carnallite, langbeinite, alunite, and polyhalite. These minerals are mainly found in sea beds and ancient lakes. Potassium is also found in caustic potash. Caustic potash is mainly mined in Germany, New Mexico, California and Utah. Annual world production of potassium is about 200 tons. Primary mining areas for Potassium are Germany, Spain, Canada, USA and Italy.
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...m in order to survive. Potassium is one of three primary nutrients required by plants.
Potassium works with sodium to aid in the digestion of food and in functioning of the eyes. People whose diets are low in potassium can develop hypokalemia, which in severe cases can be life threatening. Symptoms include irregular heartbeat, fatigue, muscle cramps and constipation. It is unusual for people to be deficient in potassium just because of getting too little of it in their diets, and usually is caused by other ongoing issues in the digestive system.
There are few uses for potassium as a pure element because of its highly reactive nature. When handled there must be full skin and eye protection, and in most cases a explosion-resistant barrier between the user and the metal. In the United States potassium chloride is used for executions by a lethal injection.
Together extra-renal factors (insulin, epinephrine, aldosterone) and renal factors maintain a normal potassium plasma concentration in the body. The extra-renal mechanisms are responsible for moving potassium into the intracellular compartment. The renal mechanisms are responsible for chronic maintenance of body potassium content. When these mechanisms are functioning correctly, large intake of potassium has a minor and insignificant effect on the potassium concentration in the plasma. [5&6]
From King Midas’ greed to the treasure of the Incas, gold is easily the most widely treasured metal known throughout history. Nearly every culture or group has placed heavy inherent value on it and includes it in their lore. Even the name for gold was graciously thought out and applied. It is derived from the word “geolo”, the Old English word for “yellow”. The periodic symbol for gold, Au, is from the Latin word aurum, “glowing dawn” . Its uses are both, immeasurable and prehistoric. However, its use in the electrodeposition process, the main discussion in this paper, has only been dated back to roughly 1850. Unlike gold, potassium was only acknowledged as an element in the early 1800’s. Potassium Cyanide has a grim history of murder and suicide. Most research on the compound is devoted to the effects it has on humans. Potassium Cyanide, in the industrial sense, is used as a reducing agent, in chemical analysis, metallurgy, and in the process of gold extraction. Uses of Potassium Cyanide also extend into pharmacy and photography .
Strontium was discovered by Adair Crawford, an Irish chemist, in 1790 while studying the mineral witherite (BaCO3). When he mixed witherite with hydrochloric acid (HCl), he did not get the results he expected. He assumed that his sample of witherite was contaminated with an unknown mineral, a mineral he named strontianite (SrCO3). Strontium was first isolated by Sir Humphry Davy, an English chemist, in 1808 through the electrolysis of a mixture of strontium chloride (SrCl2) and mercuric oxide (HgO). Strontium reacts vigorously with water and quickly tarnishes in air, so it must be stored out of contact with air and water. Due to its extreme reactivity to air, this element always naturally occurs combined with other elements and compounds. Strontium is very
The Periodic Table of Elements is a table that arranges all known chemical elements by order of their atomic numbers. During the 1600s, vast amounts of knowledge about the properties of elements and their compounds were discovered and by 1869 63 elements had been discovered. As more and more elements were discovered, scientists began to recognise similarities between their properties and began to devise means of classification. Thus the periodic table of elements was created. The current periodic table contains 117 elements, however more may yet be discovered. The elements in the periodic table are classified in groups, periods and blocks. Groups refer to elements with similar properties and are the vertical columns of the table. The periods are the horizontal rows and illustrate the number of valence electrons each element has (how many electrons are in the outer shell of the element). The position an element is in on the table allows a scientist to easily judge its properties, its reactivity and its similarities to other elements.
The Beryllium element, an alkaline earth metal which belongs to group II of the periodic table, was first discovered in 1798 by L.M. Vauquelin. Vauquelin,a French chemist, was doing work with aluminum and noticed a white powder that was nothing like that of aluminum or any of its derivatives. Vauquelin named this mystery powder, gluinium because of its sweet taste was like that of glucose. In 1828, Wohler, a German metallurgist reduced it to its metallic form and renamed it beryllium.(figure 2)
Krypton is a very cool element, I mean come on it forms a hard crystal called “kryptonite” that hurts superman and could possibly kill him. As you read this essay it will discuss the discovery of the element, what it looks like, the common uses of it and where it is commonly found, why my element is interesting, and how the people who read this essay will remember the element Krypton. First it will discuss, the discovery of the element.
Calcium is the 20th element of the periodic table. It is a metallic element that is greyish-silver in colour and has the atomic symbol of Ca. It is a group 2 alkaline earth metal and is the 5th most abundant element by mass in earth’s crust. It is also reactive with water and is relatively soft. It is an essential element for organisms, and is major material that is used in the materialisation of teeth, bone and shells. It is also the most abundant metal located within animals.
Potassium (K+) is an important mineral the body needs to maintain and regulate many functions in the body. It is essential to life because it helps balance body water, regulate blood pressure, maintain heart function, and facilitate various cellular and tissue functions. Its function inside the cells is influenced by it positive electrical charge, which makes it a cation and an electrolyte, or a substance that regulates the flow of molecules, particularly water, across cell membranes.
Uranium was discovered by Martin Heinrich Klaproth, a German chemist, in the mineral pitchblende (primarily a mix of uranium oxides) in 1789.Klaproth, as well as the rest of the scientific community, believed that the substance he extracted from pitchblende was pure uranium, it was actually uranium dioxide (UO2). After noticing that 'pure' uranium reacted oddly with uranium tetrachloride (UCl4), Radioactivity was first discovered in 1896 when Antoine Henri Becquerel, a French physicist, detected it from a sample of uranium. Today, uranium is obtained from uranium ores such as pitchblende, uraninite , carnotite and autunite as well as from phosphate rock , lignite (brown coal) and monazite sand . Since there is little demand for uranium metal, uranium is usually sold in the form of sodium diuranate , also known as yellow cake, or triuranium octoxide).
Potassium is one of the most important elements in human diet. To begin with, potassium works with sodium for various reasons. For example, it helps to regulate body waste, control heart rhythms, and assist in reducing high blood pressure. It also aids in clear thinking by sending oxygen to the brain. This element is crucial to the maintenance of the nervous system and the muscular system. Potassium is an electrolyte, and therefor regulates the balance of fluids inside and outside the cells, including blood.
From the Greek word "lithos" meaning "stone", it was so named due to the fact that it was discovered from a mineral source; whereas the other two common Group 1 elements, Sodium and Potassium, were found in plant sources. Its symbol, Li, was taken directly from its name. Soon after stumbling upon Lithium, Arfvedson also found traces of the metal in the minerals Spodumene and Lepidolite. In 1818, C.G. Gmelin discovered that Lithium salts color flames a bright red. Neither, Gmelin or Arfvedson, however, were able to isolate the element itself from the Lithium salts. They both tried to reduce the oxide by heating it with Iron or Carbon, but neither met with the success of W.T. Brande and Sir Humphrey Davy. They managed to perform the first isolation of elemental Lithium by the electrolysis of Lithium oxide. Electrolysis is a chemical reaction, which is brought about by the passage of current from an external energy source such as a battery. In 1855, the scientists Bunsen and Mattiessen isolated larger quantities of the metal by electrolysis of Lithium chloride.
Aluminum is the most abundant metallic constituent in the crust of the earth; only the nonmetals oxygen and silicon are more abundant. Aluminum is never found as a free metal; commonly as aluminum silicate or as a silicate of aluminum mixed with other metals such as sodium, potassium, iron, calcium, and magnesium. These silicates are not useful ores, for it is chemically difficult, and therefore an expensive process, to extract aluminum from them. bauxite an impure h...
The Periodic Table of Elements is commonly used today when studying elements. This table’s history begins in ancient times when Greek scientists first started discovering different elements. Over the years, many different forms of the periodic table have been made which set the basis for the modern table we use today. This table includes over 100 elements and are arranged by groups and periods. Groups being vertical columns and periods being horizontal columns. With all of the research conducted over the years and the organization of this table, it is easy to use when needed.
These are some of the many properties reasons and qualifications for us using sodium in our everyday lives. These are the reasons why sodium is used all around the world to this very day and is also why we use so much of it. Ammonia has an important role in the formation of salt crystallizations which is why it is mentioned in the above paragraph and which so will be used in the experiment that is going to take place to test the importance of ammonia in salt crystallization and to see exactly how the ammonia is going to affect the salt in the end result.