Week 1: Elements & The Periodic Table

2/3/2019

Feb 4 - 9
Posts Are Due By Midnight On Saturday Feb. 9th

Amy Zhu link

2/4/2019 07:43:00 am

4 new chemical elements have been added to the periodic table: elements 113, 115, 117, and 118. These elements were discovered by researchers in Japan, Russia and the United States. They are officially verified and will be given permanent names, according to the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry, but are now being used by their working names (i.e. ununseptium).

Matthew Mao link

2/4/2019 08:48:58 pm

Funnily enough, 2019 marks the 150th year of the Periodic Table's history since Dmitri Mendeleev struggled to put the first version together in 1869. The article quickly talks about the PT's creation and how it became universally known, as well as how something created so long ago managed not only to stay relevant, but even predict new elements later found along the way. This really only seems to prove that many things in science are still left to be discovered... even after a century and a half!

Anmol

2/5/2019 04:59:28 pm

Staff members from the University of St. Andrews have found what they think is the world’s oldest example of a periodic table. The table that they found dates back to 1885 and is printed in German. They stumbled upon it while cleaning out the storage room in the School of Chemistry at the university. It was found along with lots of old teaching equipment. Researchers were able to narrow down the date by looking at the elements printed. For example, germanium, which was discovered in 1886 was not included in the chart. This article displays how much the periodic table has changed throughout the years to become what it is now.

https://www.livescience.com/64545-oldest-periodic-table-elements-poster

David Hui

2/6/2019 06:34:30 pm

This article talks about the history of the periodic table as it turns 150. It highlights some of the controversies surrounding the placement of some elements, such as lutetium and lawrencium, as well as some cool facts, such as that Mercury was able to help scientists find the location of one of Lewis and Clark's camp sites.

Reference: https://www.sciencenews.org/article/periodic-table-elements-chemistry-fun-facts-history

Brianna Luo

2/7/2019 04:27:48 pm

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yYdMyMtb67k

In this clip from the Big Bang Theory, a very drunk Sheldon assumes that we have a deep understanding of math and science before carrying on with his jokes and song, most of which were actually based on material that we are familiar with---the Mobius strip, neutrons and the periodic table. This shows that some people assume that only super educated people will understand ideas related to science, while in reality, it’s common knowledge.

Teagan Kukhtab link

2/8/2019 03:47:59 pm

There have been many attempts to organize the periodic table. Chemists mostly tried to separate them by chemical and physical properties but the endeavors usually failed. Mendeleev's proposal was, however, the most orderly design – being organized by atomic weight, and chemical and physical properties – and therefore became the one we know today.

Sat Arora link

2/8/2019 07:10:55 pm

Happy 150th Anniversary of the Periodic Table!!
A big problem that has emerged recently is climate change (because of the extreme use of fossil fuels). However, efficient use of elements for solar energy has lots of potential, but to this day that potential has not been reached. The use of transition metals (such as ruthenium) is key, but there must be enough of these elements for solar panels to be mass produced (which is why ruthenium is not an option). Inspecting patterns in the periodic table is quite important, as Dmitri Mendeleev had thought about these patterns in elements when making a basic construction of the Periodic Table. Michigan State University has done lots of research to find efficient ways to use common elements such as iron that will make solar energy available globally and very efficient. There is still much research to do, but studying deep patterns in the Periodic Table and experimenting with different elements and compounds is key to moving forward in this goal of getting efficiency to the prime with solar panels.

Henry Zhang link

2/8/2019 07:53:27 pm

Thought it was cool that this year is the 150th anniversary of the periodic table. It started development by Mendeleev in 1869 which is 150 years ago.

Aparna Maheshwari link

2/9/2019 09:23:52 am

The periodic table of elements has become 150 years old in 2019. The year 2019 has been declared as the international year of the periodic table by the United Nations. This will raise awareness of how chemistry can provide solutions to global challenges in agriculture, education, energy and health.

Christine Wong

2/9/2019 07:15:26 pm

While it was learned in class that Dmitri Mendeleev started the development of the modern periodic table, it is interesting to note that his first version of the table, created in 1869, had no inclusion of the noble gases. The simplest reason was that none of the noble gas elements were discovered yet. It was difficult to detect their existence, because the noble gases almost never react with other elements due to their full valence electrons, and that they were colourless and odourless.
As well, Mendeleev has ordered the elements by their atomic mass, and then discovered that this creates a pattern between elements on their properties. However, as we can see on today’s periodic table, the increase of the atomic mass doesn’t follow a specific pattern. Mendeleev was able to interpolate trends in his periodic table to predict some undiscovered elements at the time, but predicting elements based on the increase of a sequence of numbers disrupts the periodic trend he discovered. Because of this, he couldn’t extrapolate the data and predict a whole family of unknown elements when there were no discovered elements within that possible family to support his prediction. Thus, the noble gases were not included until after William Ramsay’s discovery of them in the 1890’s, almost two decades after Mendeleev’s periodic table was made.

(history of periodic table) http://www.rsc.org/periodic-table/history/about
(physical property of noble gases) https://www.sciencedaily.com/terms/noble_gas.htm

Eric Tieu link

2/11/2019 02:29:59 pm

In an episode of The Big Bang Theory, Sheldon Cooper competes against Chinese scientists for receiving the credit of discovering a new element. After calculations, Sheldon realizes that he used the wrong reaction rates, as he was told that the Chinese beat him to the discovery.

Comments are closed.