Be

Atomic #: 4

"Going somewhere hot? Beryllium can take you places that gold cannot!"

• Facts
• Glossary
• Bibliography

• Properties / Family
• History
• Uses

Beryllium has many uses.  It is very tolerant of high heats.  It's melting point is 1278 degrees Celsius.  Because it is so tolerant of high heats it is used in missiles, air crafts, and space crafts.  When it forms a compound with copper it is popular in non-spark tools.  But beryllium alone is also used in non-spark tools, even though it is more popular with copper.  It is also used in x-ray tube windows, watch springs, and heat conducting ceramics.  It is used in springs because it produces extremely elastic alloys.  Beryllium alloys are becoming more popular in non-spark tools, then they were before.  Beryllium also makes up approximately .00001% of the earth's crust.

Beryllium is found in Union of South Africa, Southern Rhodesia, Brazil, and India.  There are also workable supplies of domestic ores in Colorado, South Dakota, and New England.  Beryllium is named after beryl.  Beryl is a complex compound of beryllium, silicon, and oxygen. It's scientific name is beryllium aluminum silicate.  It was known as glucinum before because it has a sweet taste, but that name is no longer used.  Continual exposure to beryllium or it's compounds could lead to a serious or fatal disease called berylliosis.. It is a metal and solid at room temperature.  It's atomic mass is 9.0 amu, it's atomic number is four, it's chemical symbol is Be, it has fur protons, four electrons, and five neutrons.  It is in group two, and period two.  It has a hexagonal crystal structure in its atom.  There are beryl crystals with chromium traces in emeralds, which give them their green shade.  There are also beryl crystals in aquamarine stones.

Beryllium only became popular in labs about ten years ago. In one book I read it said that beryllium was discovered by Fredrick WOhler, A.A. Busy in Germany/France in 1798. Another book I read said that it was also discovered in 1798, but by a French chemist named Louis-Nicolas Vanguelin who was also credited with discovering chromium. He was investigating structures of beryl and emeralds when he found beryllium. Beryllium's name comes from the mineral beryl because it is mostly found in minerals like beryl and chrysoberyl.

Beryllium belongs to the Alkaline-earth metal group. This is group 2. Along with most of it's family members Beryllium is a good conductor of thermal energy, it can be drawn into thin wires in electrical devices, it is malleable, and it has few electrons in the outer energy level. It is shiny, very reactive, silvery-gray-whitish colored, and many of the compounds with beryllium in it are toxic. Beryllium is the first Alkaline-earth metal. It is the lightest rigid metal. It has four protons, four electrons, and five neutrons.

Berylliosis - Beryllium exposure may produce acute pnecumonitis or chronic interstitial pneumonia.  Can be histologically indistinguishable from sarcoldosis

Amu - Atomic Mass Unit

Malleable - Able to be flattened without shattering

alloy - a substance composed of two or more metals or of a metal and a nonmetal intimately united usually by being fused together and dissolving in each other when molten

Sisler, Harry H, and Calvin A. Vanderwert, and Arthur W. Davidson. General Chemistry, A Systematic Approach. The Macmillan Company, New York c. 1959

Stwertka, Albert. A Guide To Elements. Oxford University Press, New York - Oxford. c. 1996

images found at:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/business/newsid_1373000/1373956.stm

http://www.vivanewmexico.com/science.html

http://www.hitechnatur.ch/bauen/7/herz.html

http://www.flamingtext.com