Elements

[Dekka]

http://www.bpc.edu/mathscience/chemistry/i...of_elements.jpg ~Linked for size~

So. Here is a place to discuss the elements.

What is your favorite? Why?

Go on, go on! Discuss.

Edited June 25, 2014 by SockPuppet Strangler

[renlacarne]

I adore silver

i just love the metal and the color and that it is used in so many different things and we dont even think about it

its a very precious and very valuable metal

 

[Twyro]

My favourite element... Hmmm... I have more:

 

- gold (because it's my numberfour favourite color)

- oxygen (because I wouldn't be alive without it )

- and I like helium (I like the way it makes my voice sound, it's pretty awesome )

[Dekka]

Can we bring this guy back?

 

Also, here's to me forgetting to put my own favorite. ;u;

Cesium and gallium. Melty nontoxic metals. Very fun. Enough said.

[ChocolateIzzy]

I love Lithium, germanium and arsenic

 

I memorised the periodic table up to technetium :3

[CursedFlames]

Hydrogen, because as an ion it's just a proton

 

Iron, because nuclear fusion and fission.

Edited November 2, 2016 by BananaGummyBear64

[Orlageddon]

Oh wow I basically live with my nose in the periodic table. Can recite it every which way and am working on personifying and drawing all the elements (I don't mean to hijack this place with that, but my dA is in sig ). How come I didn't find this before? This thread MUST LIVE. I love hearing about people's favorite elements, it's my favorite question~

 

Btw, if you haven't seen one before, this is what an Aspie can look like talking about their 'special interest' lol

 

The pnictogens, aka Group 15, would be my favorite family of the periodic table by far. That's nitrogen, phosphorus, arsenic, antimony and bismuth. They're just a really interesting and varied group, each element's properties are so different in its own unique way. You have mellow elements that won't hurt you, then spontaneously combusting glow-in-the-dark craziness and deadly poisons. Elements that both build and destroy life, all in one group. And most of them have been around for a long time and have strange and exciting stories behind them. My babesss. *gets a little too excited over elements*

Nitrogen is a perfectly nice atmospheric inert gas in its regular form... but it can and will mess you up in particular compounds. You know trinitrotoluene aka TNT? It blows up because of nitrogen. Or nitric acid? Stuff that you don't want to meet in a dark alley, and combine it with some HCl and you can go dissolving gold. GOLD. Heck, not even platinum, the ultimate noble metal, stands a chance against aqua regia.

Phosphorus, my fave, has three basic forms, white, red and black. And white phosphorus, that's something you don't want to mess with. It's pyrophoric, meaning it spontaneously catches fire if you just leave it standing in the air, and it's also toxic and glows a green light in the dark. (Which is what has earned it its name - 'bringer of light' in Greek.) It was the first and only element ever discovered by an alchemist (through a completely gross process involving distilling urine, too) and allegedly the 13th to be discovered, earning it the nickname 'Devil's element'.

Arsenic, who wouldn't know arsenic? The king of poisons and poison of kings, as they call it, its trioxide being a colorless, tasteless, odorless, potent poison that people have used to sort out their affairs for hundreds, if not thousands of years. (Not as good nowadays, though, since we have the very sensitive Marsh test now.)

Antimony is my second favorite. Barely known nowadays, but in my view, it has just about the wildest, quirkiest past an element can possibly have. This article nails it better than I ever could, imo. x3 (Also this post would be way long. It already sorta is)

And ending it off with bismuth... sitting smack dab between the worst poisons of the periodic table, surrounded by mercury, thallium and lead from the left, arsenic and antimony from above, and polonium from the right, one would expect it to be incredibly toxic - but there's the thing, it's not. Actually it's such a goody two shoes that you can find it in stomach medicine - ever heard of Pepto-Bismol? Of course you have. But the BEST thing about bismuth, hands down, are its absolutely mesmerizing crystals. Normally, it's an unassuming pinkish white metal, but if you oxidize it just so, out comes this beautiful iridescent surface. <3

 

I have a bunch of different favorites, but... let's leave that for a different time?

 

Can we bring this guy back?

Also, here's to me forgetting to put my own favorite. ;u;

Cesium and gallium.  Melty nontoxic metals.  Very fun.  Enough said.

Eh, nontoxic they are alright, but beware of caesium... It may not poison you, but it's the worst of the alkali metals, which react with water violently, and will explode on contact if you touch it So please don't! Provided you can get your hands on some in the first place.

It's such a pretty golden liquid when you warm it a little while keeping it safely under argon, though <3

(Random chemist nitpickery over... sorry ahahaa)

 

Can this be my topic to post random periodic table facts from time to time? Please? Pretty please? owo I'm in my element over here. /shot

[FiveSix]

As a biochemist I'm pretty fond of the ones required for life :3 The obvious stuff like C, O, N, P, H and Fe, and the less obvious ones like K, Ca, Na, Cl, Mn, Mo, S, Zn and Mg.

 

Edit: I definitely know you from somewhere Orlageddon (not IRL, somewhere on the internet), 'cause your name was familiar the first time I saw you on here and I know I've seen that comic before.

Edited January 24, 2015 by ObsessedWithCats

[ChocolateIzzy]

Sulfur is the widely known trademark of demons. (Usually they leave it behind)