Elements-Chemistry Part 1

ELEMENTS

—Substances that cannot be broken down or decomposed into simpler substances.

—Simplest form of matter that a chemist work with directly.

—Each element is assigned a chemical symbol. The symbol is formed from one or two letters of the English name for the element.

How Are Elements Named? 

—Element names are not the same in every country. Many countries have adopted the element names that have been agreed upon by the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry (IUPAC). 

—According to the IUPAC, "elements can be named after a mythological concept, a mineral, a place or country, a property, or a scientist".  

—GREEK ORIGIN

—Actinium (Ac) – aktis means beam or ray

—Argon (Ar)- argos means inactive

—Astatine (At)- astatos means unstable

—Cadmium (Cd) – kadmia means earth

—Iodine (I) – iodes means violet

—Neon (Ne) – neos means new

—Radon ( Rn) – rhodon means rose

—Tantalum (Ta)- Tantalus a greek mythology

  

—LATIN ORIGIN 

element	orig
Copper (Cu)	Cuprum
Gold  (Au)	Aurum
Iron (Fe)	Ferrum
Lead (Pb)	Plumbum
Mercury (Hg)	Hyrargyrum
Potassium (K)	Kalium
Silver (Ag)	Argentum
Sodium (Na)	natrium

—Place origin

—Europium (Eu) – europe

—Americium (Am) – america

—Berkelium (Bk) – berkely, california

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Planet origin

  Neptunium (Np)- neptune

  Plutonium (Pu) - pluto

 

—NAME ORIGIN

—Mendelevium (Md) – Dmitri Mendeleev, a Russian chemist who prepared the periodic table

—Einsteinium (Es) – Albert Einstein

—Fermium (Fm) – Enrico Fermi

 

—How Are New Elements Discovered?

—Dmitri Mendeleev is credited with making the first periodic table that resembles the modern periodic table.

—His table ordered the elements by increasing atomic weight (we use atomic number today).

—His table could be used to predict the existence and characteristics of elements that hadn't been discovered. 

—When you look at the modern periodic table, you won't see gaps and spaces in the order of the elements. New elements aren't exactly discovered anymore.

—However, they can be made, using particle accelerators and nuclear reactions.

—A new element is made by adding a proton (or more than one) to a pre-existing element. This can be done by smashing protons into atoms or by colliding atoms with each other. All of the new elements are highly radioactive.

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—How Many Elements Are Found in Nature?

—There are 90 elements that occur in nature. Of the first 92 elements on the periodic table, where 1 is hydrogen and 92 is uranium, 90 elements occur naturally.

—Technetium (atomic number 43) and promethium (atomic number 61) are man-made elements that have no naturally occurring isotopes.

—All of the elements past uranium on the periodic table exist solely in synthesized form.

What Is the Most Abundant Element?   

—The most abundant element in the universe is hydrogen, which makes up about 3/4 of all matter!

— Helium makes up most of the remaining 25%.

—Oxygen is the third most abundant element in the universe.

The most abundant element in the earth's crust is

—Oxygen, making up 46.6% of the earth's mass.

—Silicon is the second most abundant element (27.7%)

—Aluminum (8.1%)

—Iron (5.0%),

— Calcium (3.6%),

—Sodium (2.8%),

—Potassium (2.6%). and Magnesium (2.1%).

What Are the Elements in the Human Body?
 

—Most of the human body is made up of water, H2O, with cells consisting of 65-90% water by weight. Therefore, it isn't surprising that most of a human body's mass is oxygen.

—Carbon, the basic unit for organic molecules, comes in second. 99% of the mass of the human body is made up of just six elements: oxygen, carbon, hydrogen, nitrogen, calcium, and phosphorus.

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Reference: H. A. Harper, V. W. Rodwell, P. A. Mayes, Review of Physiological Chemistry, 16th ed., Lange Medical Publications, Los Altos, California 1977.

  Importance of some elements in the body

elements	Where it is found
Oxygen	Protiens, carbohydrates, fats and water
Carbon	Carbohydrates,fats and protiens
Hydrogen	Water, carbohydrates, fats and protiens
Nitrogen	Protiens, DNA and RNA
Calcium	Bones and teeth
Sulfur	Some amino acids
Potassium	Inside cells (impotant in the conduction of impulses)
Chlorine	Outside cells (major electrolytes)
Magnesium	Bone ( important in enzyme function)
Sodium	Body fluids ( important in nerve conduction and fluid balance