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There are currently 118 known chemical elements with a wide range of physical and chemical properties. Amongst this diversity, scientists have found it useful to apply names for various sets of elements that have similar properties, to varying degrees. Many of these sets are formally recognized by the standards body IUPAC. [1]
Elements with similar chemical properties generally fall into the same group in the periodic table, although in the f-block, and to some respect in the d-block, the elements in the same period tend to have similar properties, as well.
The lighter three Group 5 elements occur naturally and share similar properties; all three are hard refractory metals under standard conditions. The fourth element, dubnium , has been synthesized in laboratories, but it has not been found occurring in nature, with half-life of the most stable isotope, dubnium-268, being only 16 hours, and other ...
Arranged this way, elements in the same group (column) have similar chemical and physical properties, reflecting the periodic law. For example, the halogens lie in the second-to-last group ( group 17 ) and share similar properties, such as high reactivity and the tendency to gain one electron to arrive at a noble-gas electronic configuration.
In the periodic table of the elements, each column is a group. In chemistry, a group (also known as a family) [1] is a column of elements in the periodic table of the chemical elements. There are 18 numbered groups in the periodic table; the 14 f-block columns, between groups 2 and 3, are not numbered.
The chemical elements can be broadly divided into metals, metalloids, and nonmetals according to their shared physical and chemical properties.All elemental metals have a shiny appearance (at least when freshly polished); are good conductors of heat and electricity; form alloys with other metallic elements; and have at least one basic oxide.
Thus, on both descending a period and crossing a group by one element, the changes "cancel" each other out, and elements with similar properties which have similar chemistry are often found – the atomic radius, electronegativity, properties of compounds (and so forth) of the diagonal members are similar.
The properties of the elements are often summarized using the periodic table, which powerfully and elegantly organizes the elements by increasing atomic number into rows in which the columns share recurring ("periodic") physical and chemical properties. The table contains 118 confirmed elements as of 2021.