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Because the other platinum-family members were not discovered yet (platinum was the first in the list), Scheffer and Sickingen made the false assumption that due to its hardness—which is slightly more than for pure iron—platinum would be a relatively non-pliable material, even brittle at times, when in fact its ductility and malleability ...
A small box from the burial of the Pharaoh Shepenupet II (died around 650 BC) was found to be decorated with gold-platinum hieroglyphics, [36] but the Egyptians may not have recognised that there was platinum in their gold. [37] [38] First European description of a metal found in South American gold was in 1557 by Julius Caesar Scaliger.
Naturally occurring platinum and platinum-rich alloys were known by pre-Columbian Americans for many years. [5] However, even though the metal was used by pre-Columbian peoples, the first European reference to platinum appears in 1557 in the writings of the Italian humanist Julius Caesar Scaliger (1484–1558) as a description of a mysterious metal found in Central American mines between ...
The other metals discovered before the Scientific Revolution largely fit the pattern, except for high-melting platinum: Bismuth melts at 272 °C (521 °F) [21] Zinc melts at 420 °C (787 °F), [21] but importantly boils at 907 °C (1665 °F), a temperature below the melting point of silver. Consequently, at the temperatures needed to reduce ...
Edmund Davy FRS (1785 – 5 November 1857) [ 1 ] was a professor of chemistry at the Royal Cork Institution from 1813 and at the Royal Dublin Society from 1826. [ 2 ] He discovered acetylene, as it was later named [ 3 ] by Marcellin Berthelot. He was also an original member of the Chemical Society, and a member of the Royal Irish Academy.
Platinum, the third precious metal after gold and silver, was discovered in Ecuador during the period 1736 to 1744 by the Spanish astronomer Antonio de Ulloa and his colleague the mathematician Jorge Juan y Santacilia. Ulloa was the first person to write a scientific description of the metal, in 1748.
Precious metals occurring as fission products. Ruthenium and rhodium are precious metals produced as a small percentage of the fission products from the nuclear fission of uranium. The longest half-lives of the radioisotopes of these elements generated by nuclear fission are 373.59 days for ruthenium and 45 days for rhodium [clarification needed].
Davy discovered potassium in 1807, deriving it from caustic potash (KOH). Before the 19th century, no distinction had been made between potassium and sodium. Potassium was the first metal that was isolated by electrolysis. Davy isolated sodium in the same year by passing an electric current through molten sodium hydroxide. [27]