![]() ![]() You know, why is the sky blue? We make observations and try to make sense out of these observations and that's what science is all about. We ask questions, all kinds of questions. Shakhashiri: Human beings all of us are naturally curious. So they range from one, which is element hydrogen, all the way to element 118 which is the total number of elements in the periodic table today,Ĭhuck Quirmbach: Was he creating this and and the others that can certainly contributed to it, were they trying to serve some industry like cannon makers? That's the number of protons in an atom of that element. We learn the periodic table as the elements arranged according to the atomic number, which is an integer, a whole number. Later on, this turned out to be not so correct, but that's how it is in science. He proposed, sometimes, you know, people say he discovered the pattern of similar behavior and arranged the elements, according to are their atomic weights. And it came to him that there possibly is a pattern of repeated resemblance of behavior of certain elements. Read the full transcript of WUWM's Chuck Quirmbach and Bassam Shakhashiri's conversation here:īassam Shakhashiri: Mendeleev the Russian chemist was teaching a course and he was writing his lecture notes and tried to write an inorganic chemistry book about chemical behavior of substances. Nowadays, lead is often viewed as a contaminant in soil and water. ![]() Shakhashiri also notes how lead (symbol Pb) has a less popular image than in Mendeleev's day. Lithium is also used in the medical profession, for a variety of things." On modern relevance, and how uses of the elements change, Shakhashiri cites lithium (symbol Li), in the table: "Lithium batteries are very useful to us. "Dimitri Mendeleev, the Russian chemist, he proposed - sometimes people say he discovered - the pattern of similar behavior and arranged them," Shakhashiri explains. He says the table came about through a collaboration of a few scientists but that Dmitri Mendeleev properly gets much of the credit. UW-Madison professor of chemistry Bassam Shakhashiri knows both the history of the table, and its modern relevance. It's considered the founding document of modern chemistry, one you may have studied in school. Its availability limits the amount of life our planet can sustain.Maybe you've felt a certain chemistry with 2019 but don't know why? Maybe it's because this year marks the 150th anniversary of the Periodic Table of the Elements. Phosphorus, then, is nature’s bottleneck. Unlike carbon, which can be obtained from carbon dioxide, there is no phosphorus compound present in our surroundings that can serve as a convenient source. We need phosphorus for our bones and teeth, and it is a crucial component of all living cells. Phosphorus makes up 1.1% of the human body but only 0.105% of Earth’s crust. There is an element that we need more of in our bodies than is proportionately present in Earth’s crust, and this element is not easily accessible. Looking Closer: The Phosphorous Bottleneck On the other hand, although carbon is present in the atmosphere as carbon dioxide, and about 80% of the atmosphere is nitrogen, we obtain those two elements from the food we eat, not the air we breathe. We obtain oxygen from the air we breathe and the water we drink. How does the human body concentrate so many apparently rare elements? The relative amounts of elements in the body have less to do with their abundances on Earth than with their availability in a form we can assimilate. Oxygen has the highest percentage in both cases, but carbon, the element with the second highest percentage in the body, is relatively rare on Earth and does not even appear as a separate entry carbon is part of the 0.174% representing “other” elements. If you compare both compositions, you will find disparities between the percentage of each element in the human body and on Earth. \) also lists the relative abundances of elements in the human body. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |