| Chemistry Facts |
| 1.An element's name must be approved by the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry, or I.U.P.A.C., in Geneva, Switzerland. 2.The heaviest element gas is radon at room temperature. (There may be heavier ones, but they are compunds not atoms). It was discovered by Friedrich Ernst Dorn in Germany in 1900, but he first called it niton, until 1923. 3.The lightest gas is hydrogen, it is also the lightest of all elements. 4.The element with the highest melting/freezing point is carbon at 6,381 degrees Fahrenheit (3,527 degrees Celsius). 5.The element with the highest boiling point is rhenium at 10,105 degrees Fahrenheit (5,596 degrees Celsius). 6.The element with the lowest melting/freezing point is helium at -458 degrees Fahrenheit (-272.2 degrees Celsius). 7.The element with the lowest boiling point is also helium at -452.07 degrees Fahrenheit (-268.93 degrees Celsius. 8.The word "atom" comes from the Greek word atomos, meaning "uncut." 9.In 1964, scientists in Russia discovered element 104, and suggested the name Kurchatovium and symbol Ku in honor of Igor Vasilevich Kurchatov. Then in 1969, scientists in the U.S. also found element 104, and propsed the name Rutherfordium (symbol Rf), in the honor of the New Zealand physicist Ernest R. Rutherford. To get the names past the I.U.P.A.C., it won with rutherfordium. 10.The first and relatively pure atom of tantalum was produced by von Bolton in 1907. 11.Andres Manual del Rio discovered what we call today vanadium. He called it panchromium, and then changed it to erythronium (red), after noting that upon heating it turned red. In 1831, Nils Gabriel Sefström (a Swedish chemist) was working with some iron ores and this matter was lead to honor the Northern Germanic tribes' goddess Vanadis due to its inspiration in multi-colors. In the same year, Friedrich Wöhler came into posession of del Rio's erythronium, and confirmed it to be vanadium, after Vanadis. The name Vanadium is now being used instead of del Rio's erythronium. 12.Hafnium was named after the city of Copenhagen, Denmark. 13.The heaviest type of lepton is the tau. 14.At 0 degress Celsius and 1 atmospheric pressure, one mole of any gas occupies approximately 22.4 liters. 15.Atomic weight is the mass of an atom relative to the mass of an atom of carbon-12 which has an atomic wieght of exactly 12.00000 amu. 16.If the atom were the size of a pixel (or the size of a period), humans would be a thousand miles tall. 17.It would require about 100 million (100,000,000) atoms to form a straight line one centimeter long. 18.The weight (or mass) of a proton is 1,836.1526675 times heavier than the weight (or mass) of an electron. 19.The electron was first discovered before the proton and neutron, in 1897 from English physicist John Joseph Thomson. 20.The neutron was discovered after the proton in 1932 from British physicist James Chadwick, which proved an important discovery in the development of nuclear reactors. 21.Carbon dioxide was discovered by Scottish chemist Joseph Black. 22.When silver nitrate is exposed to light, it results in a blackening effect. (Discovered by Scheele, which became an important discovery for the development of photography). 23.After firing 5 billion billion zinc ions at a speed of 18,460 miles per second (30,000 kilometers per second) at lead, the German scientists at Darmstadt, Germany created a single atom of 112 protons (ununbium) that survived for one third (1/3) of a millisecond. 24.If an electric current is passed through a solution or molten salt (the electrolyte), ions will migrate to the electrodes: positive ions (cations) to the negative electrode (cathode) and negative ions (anions) to the positive electrodes (anions). 25.The positron was discovered in 1932 by the U.S. physicist Carl Anderson at California Institute of Technology, United States. 26.Fritz Haber developed chlorine gas for use by the Germans in World War I. (Unable to live with his, his wife commited suicide in 1915). 27.The flatulence of a single sheep could power a small truck for 25 miles (40 kilometers) a day. The digestive process produces methane gas, which can be burned as fuel. 28.Cesiums has a diameter of 0.0000002 inches (0.0000005 millimeter). 29.Hydrogen atoms with no neutrons make up 99.985% percent of all hydrogen atoms. The remaining 0.015% percent contain one neutron. 30.The very first shell of an atom (innermost) can hold only up to two electrons. 31.Alkanes are also known as paraffins. 32.Alkenes are also known as olefins. 33.The first chemistry professor who taught chemistry only, in a regular appointed position in an educational institution of recognized standing, was Benjamin Rush, one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence, who taught as early as 1769. 34.Benjamin Rush (the first chemistry professor) published the very first chemistry textbook, called Syllabus of a Course of Lectures on Chemistry, in 1770 at Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. 35.Mercury is the only metal that is liquid at room temperature. 36.Africa's largest producer of mercury is Algeria (Africa's only producer of mercury), produces about one-tenth of the world's mercury. 37.The first compound discovered of an inert gas was xenon hexafluoroplatinate, by English chemist Neil Bartlett, in 1962. 38.It was Mexican chemist Mario Molina and U.S. chemist F. Sherwood Rowland that warned that the chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) used in refrigerators may be damaging the Earth's ozone layer, in 1974. 39.The only two elements named after women are curium (Marie Curie) and meitnerium (Lise Meitner). 40.The element with the most isotopes are xenon with 36 (9 stable isotopes and 27 radioactive isotopes), and cesium also with 36 (1 stable isotope and 35 radioactive isotopes). 41.The most element that exists in both the Solar System and the Universe is hydrogen, at over 90%. 42.The most powerful nerve gas is VX, more correctly known by its scientific name Ethyl S-2-diisopropylaminoethylmethyl phosphonothiolate, was developed at the Chemical Defence Experimental Establishment, Porton Down, Wiltshire, United Kingdom, in 1952, and is 300 times more powerful than the phosgene (COCl2) used in World War I. A lethal dosage is 10 milligrams. It's usually green and smells of rotting fish. 43.The smallest ice, was created by Roger Miller and Klaus Nauta in the University of North Carolina, U.S.A., in 1999. It is 6 water molecules arranged in a hexagon, theoretically the smallest ice possible. 44.The sweetest chemical compound is sucronic acid. 45.The mass or weight of the neutron is 1838.683655 times greater than the mass or weight of the electron. 46.The mass or weight of the proton is 0.99862347855 times greater than the mass or weight of the neutron. 47.The mass or weight of the neutron is 1.00137841887 times greater than the mass or weight of the proton. 48.The proton was discovered by Ernest Rutherford in 1919. 49.The mass or weight of an electron is 0.0005446170232 times that of the mass or weight of a proton. 50.The mass or weight of an electron is 0.0005438673462 times that of the mass or weight of a neutron. 51.Paper kindles or ignites at a heat termperature of 450 degrees Fahrenheit (230 degrees Celsius). 52.The only substance other than water that is less dense as a solid than as a liquid is bismuth. 53.The first organic compound to be synthesized from inorganic ingredients was done by Friedrich Wöhler in 1828 from synthesizing urea from ammonia and cyanic acid. 54.Helium was first identified when French astronomer Pierre-Jules-César Janssen obtained evidence for the existence when observing the solar eclipse of 1868 in India when he detected a new yellow line, at 587.49 nanometers, in the solar spectrum. 55.The first national chemical society in the United States was the American Chemical Society, organized in New York City on April 20, 1876. Their first president was John William Draper. 56.The first atom of darmstadtium (element 110) was detected on November 9, 1994, 4:39 p.m. at the Gesellschaft für Schwerionenforschung (GSI) in Darmstadt, Germany. The isotope discovered has an atomic number of 269 (that is, 269 times heavier than hydrogen). It was produced by fusing a nickel and a lead atom together. 57.The horizontal rows of the periodic table are called periods. 58.The vertical columns of the periodic table are called groups. 59.Each electron of an atom has four quantum numbers, which apply to its shell, subshell, orbital, and spin. 60.The hottest flame is carbon subnitride (C4N2), which at 1 atmospheric pressure it's flame is calculated to be 9,010 degrees Fahrenheit. 61.The most ductile element is gold, which at one ounce it can be drawn to a length of 43 miles. 62.The solid substance with the lowest density is aerogel. 63.Boron becomes liquid at 3,769 degrees Fahrenheit (2,076 degrees Celsius), and is so corrosive that it cannot be contained at all. |
Chemistry ---------------- |
| General facts about chemistry, including the atoms, elements, subatomic particles, and other related sciences. |