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Potassium is a chemical element; it has symbol K (from Neo-Latin kalium) and atomic number 19. It is a silvery white metal that is soft enough to easily cut with a knife. [ 9 ] Potassium metal reacts rapidly with atmospheric oxygen to form flaky white potassium peroxide in only seconds of exposure.
Like the periodic table, the list below organizes the elements by the number of protons in their atoms; it can also be organized by other properties, such as atomic weight, density, and electronegativity. For more detailed information about the origins of element names, see List of chemical element name etymologies.
Periodic table of the chemical elements showing the most or more commonly named sets of elements (in periodic tables), and a traditional dividing line between metals and nonmetals. The f-block actually fits between groups 2 and 3; it is usually shown at the foot of the table to save horizontal space.
This is a list of chemical elements and their atomic properties, ordered by atomic number (Z). Since valence electrons are not clearly defined for the d-block and f-block elements, there not being a clear point at which further ionisation becomes unprofitable, a purely formal definition as number of electrons in the outermost shell has been used.
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.
Throughout the history of chemistry, many chemical elements have been discovered. In the 19th century, Dmitri Mendeleev formulated the periodic table, a table of elements which describes their structure. Because elements have been discovered at various times and places, from antiquity through the present day, their names have derived from ...
Atomic Weights of the Elements 2001, Pure Appl. Chem. 75(8), 1107–1122, 2003. Retrieved June 30, 2005. Atomic weights of elements with atomic numbers from 1–109 taken from this source. IUPAC Standard Atomic Weights Revised Archived 2008-03-05 at the Wayback Machine (2005). WebElements Periodic Table. Retrieved June 30, 2005.
Lavoisier writes the first modern list of chemical elements – containing 33 elements including light and heat but omitting Na, K (he was unsure of whether soda and potash without carbonic acid, i.e. Na 2 O and K 2 O, are simple substances or compounds like NH 3), [91] Sr, Te; some elements were listed in the table as unextracted "radicals ...