Numbering over 100, they, in various simple and complex combinations,
are part of us and our world in all senses, making up everything in, on,
with or around us - especially the electronic gadgets that seem to have
become appendages of certain people. But only a third of these "basic
building blocks" of matter are known or encountered commonly and not
even half are in their "original" state or even visible! The story of
the 118 chemical elements is, however, most fascinating and is in
essence a history of humankind - not only its science, but economy,
biology, colours, language and culture too.
Gold, silver, iron,
platinum, aluminium, tin, copper, zinc, mercury, iodine and carbon are
elements likely to have been seen and even held in the hand, while
oxygen, nitrogen, hydrogen, neon, helium, neon and chlorine are known
but not seen and sodium, lithium, potassium, flourine, calcium, silicon
and sulphur are among those used in compound form.
Those fond of
murder mysteries involving poisoning would know of arsenic - and
polonium due to a recent real-life event. A handful of others - barium,
magnesium, cobalt, radium, uranium, cadmium, tungsten, bismuth - may
sound familiar due to various reasons but what about indium, scandium,
krypton (not Superman's home planet!), astatine, zirconium, yttrium,
ytterbium, palladium, tantalum, praseodymium and 70-odd others?
The
great masses of people who are not chemical scientists or metallurgists
are unlikely to know most elements or even care about them. But for
those interested, there are several authors who can acquaint them with
the Periodic Table's various inmates and their eventful and picturesque
history - how and by whom they were found and named and what roles they
play - since chemistry as taught in schools only focusses on their mere
physical and chemical properties (not useful outside of exams).
My
own first encounter with the story of the elements was due to the
beneficence of the then Soviet Union. As many eager readers growing up
across India in the 1980s would recall, one viable source of books was
very reasonably priced (mostly in double digits) oeuvre of the
Moscow-based Mir and Progress Publishers.
D.N. Trifonov and V.D.
Trifonov's "Chemical Elements: How They Were Discovered" (Mir, 1982 - it
cost Rs.10 then) was the first on the topic I read.
Trifonov was
a most engaging and prolific writer who penned several books that made
science enjoyable - "Silhouettes of Chemistry" was packed with stories
about various fascinating facets and applications, "The Price of Truth:
The Story of Rare-Earth Elements" about the lanthanides or elements 57
to 71 which get one place in the Periodic Table and a special row
beneath (but punch above their weight in being the essential ingredients
in making devices of modern entertainment, communication and medical
technology possible).
Another was on the actinides (radioactive
elements 89 to 103) (same arrangement), whose name might have been "On
the Trail of Super-heavy Elements", but I am not sure since I have lost
my copy.
Then there was "On Rare and Scattered Metals" by S.
Venetsky (Mir, 1981), a compendium of interesting facts, curious
incidents and tales associated with a dozen or so rare metallic
elements.
Unfortunately, these books are no longer easily available. But for those interested, there are many more.
Two
personal accounts of how the elements are intertwined with our lives
are Italian chemist and Holocaust survivor Primo Levi's (1919-87) "Il
sistema periodico (The Periodic Table)", a collection of 21 short pieces
based on episodes from his life and each related in some way to an
element, and British neurologist Oliver Sacks' (1933-) "Uncle Tungsten:
Memories of a Chemical Boyhood" (2001) about his formative years and
fascination with chemistry.
Wide-ranging accounts include Sam
Kean's "The Disappearing Spoon: And Other True Tales of Madness, Love,
and the History of the World from the Periodic Table of the Elements"
(2011) and Hugh Aldersey-Williams' "Periodic Tales: A Cultural History
of the Elements, from Arsenic to Zinc" (2012), both vividly exotic romps
across the globe and history.
The only difference is the
approach - Kean takes disparate bunches of elements, numbering three to
seven or eight (even 12 in one case) and profiles them, while
Aldersey-Williams takes one random element at a time.
A more
visual account is Theodore Grey's "The Elements: A Visual Exploration of
Every Known Atom in the Universe" (2012) (photographs by Nick Mann) or
Paul Parsons and Gail Dixon's "The Periodic Table: An Indispensable
Guide to the Elements" (2014) though the former edges slightly ahead due
to the author's penchant for collecting elements (and the scrapes this
gets him in).
There may be various ways to understand our world - the elements provide one of the most comprehensive!
(22.03.2015
- Vikas Datta is an Associate Editor at IANS. The views expressed are
personal. He can be contacted at [email protected] )
