How does polonium react with other elements

Political stability of top producer A percentile rank for the political stability of the top producing country, derived from World Bank governance indicators. Political stability of top reserve holder A percentile rank for the political stability of the country with the largest reserves, derived from World Bank governance indicators. Supply risk. Relative supply risk Unknown Crustal abundance ppm 0. Young's modulus A measure of the stiffness of a substance. Shear modulus A measure of how difficult it is to deform a material.

Bulk modulus A measure of how difficult it is to compress a substance. Vapour pressure A measure of the propensity of a substance to evaporate. Pressure and temperature data — advanced. Listen to Polonium Podcast Transcript :.

You're listening to Chemistry in its element brought to you by Chemistry World , the magazine of the Royal Society of Chemistry. Hello, this week in Chemistry in its element the story of a substance that was named to snub Russia, power space probes keeps paper static free and has even been used as a murder weapon in London.

To reveal the secrets of Marie Curie's element, and that's polonium, here's Johnny Ball. Polonium, element 84 , was discovered in and named after Poland, the homeland of Marie Curie Ne Sklodowska who found it with her husband Pierre Curie. This loyalty was a direct affront to Russia who had dominated Poland for so long. The only way she could become educated whilst a teenager, was by risking imprisonment by the Russians by attending secret underground schools, which had to change locations every couple of days.

It was only by escaping to Paris, following her older brother and sister, that she was able to forge a career. She was so poor in the early years in Paris, that she sometimes fainted through lack of food. Still she worked tirelessly. In she met Pierre, who had made a name for himself in discovering piezoelectricity and was one of her lecturers.

They married in July She wore a black dress as it would be serviceable for her work in the laboratory. They did not exchange rings, but bought each other a bicycle, on which they honeymooned. Working with him 98 , Marie coined the phrase "radioactivity" and decided to make this here object of study, because no one else was doing it.

They realised that radiation was coming from the very atoms and that this was a sign of the atoms breaking up. Only by studying the break up of atoms through radiation, were scientists able to clearly understand how atoms are made up. Pierre died in a tragic accident in In driving rain he seemed to walk in front of a large horse-drawn wagon, and a wheel shattered his head. Some think the pain he was in as a result of radiation burns and sickness may have caused his lack of awareness.

Marie was devastated, but her work continued. For discovering polonium and radium, she received the Nobel Prize for Chemistry in , becoming the only woman ever to receive two such prizes. However, there was still more success due for the family. Her daughter Irene also became a scientist, and in , Marie saw Irene and her husband Frederick Joliot-Curie produce the first ever artificial radioactive element.

This led to our modern ability to manipulate almost every element for our specific scientific needs. Irene and Frederick also received the Nobel Prize in , but sadly Marie had now died. Natural polonium, Po, is still very rare and forms no more than billions of a gram per ton of uranium ore. Because it is so rare, polonium is made by first making bismuth also found in pitchblende.

Bismuth is found and then artificially changed to bismuth which then decays to form polonium This process requires a nuclear reactor, so it is not an easy element to source. It was a shocking discovery that the former Russian agent Alexander Litvinenko was poisoned with this very radioactive element. The alpha particles it emits are so weakly penetrating it could easily have been carried in a simple sealed container, and would have to be ingested, for example in a cup of tea, to do any serious harm.

However, once inside the body, as it continued to disintegrate, it would become fatal. Polonium has a position in the periodic table that could make it a metal, a metalloid or a nonmetal.

It is classed as a metal as its electrical conductivity decreases as its temperature rises. Because of this property it is used in industry to eliminate dangerous static electricity in making paper or sheet metal. Because of its short half life, its decay generates considerable heat W per gram of metal. It can be used as a convenient and very light heat source to generate reliable thermoelectric power in space satellites and lunar stations, as no moving parts are involved.

Johnny Ball lifting the lid on the radioactive element polonium discovered by Marie Curie and her husband Pierre. Next time on Chemistry in its element we remain radioactive much like the substance itself with earth scientist Ian Farnan. Anyone familiar with the iconic image of the mushroom cloud understands the tremendous explosive power of a correctly controlled detonation of plutonium. The energy density is mind-boggling: a sphere of metal 10 cm in diameter and weighing just 8 kg is enough to produce an explosion at least as big as the one that devastated Nagasaki in Ian Farnan with what promises to be an explosive edition of Chemistry in its element next week.

I'm Chris Smith, thank you for listening and see you next time. Chemistry in its element is brought to you by the Royal Society of Chemistry and produced by thenakedscientists. There's more information and other episodes of Chemistry in its element on our website at chemistryworld. Click here to view videos about Polonium. View videos about. Help Text. Learn Chemistry : Your single route to hundreds of free-to-access chemistry teaching resources. We hope that you enjoy your visit to this Site.

We welcome your feedback. Data W. Haynes, ed. Version 1. Coursey, D. Schwab, J. Tsai, and R. Dragoset, Atomic Weights and Isotopic Compositions version 4.

Periodic Table of Videos , accessed December Podcasts Produced by The Naked Scientists. Download our free Periodic Table app for mobile phones and tablets. Explore all elements. D Dysprosium Dubnium Darmstadtium. E Europium Erbium Einsteinium.

F Fluorine Francium Fermium Flerovium. G Gallium Germanium Gadolinium Gold. I Iron Indium Iodine Iridium. K Krypton. O Oxygen Osmium Oganesson. But during the same period, the level of polonium in American tobacco had tripled. This coincided with the increase in the use of phosphate fertilizers by tobacco growers - calcium phosphate ore accumulates uranium and slowly releases radon gas.

As radon decays, its electrically charged daughter products attach themselves to dust particles, which adhere to the sticky hairs on the underside of tobacco leaves. This leaves a deposit of radioactive polonium and lead on the leaves. Then, the intense localized heat in the burning tip of a cigarette volatilizes the radioactive metals. While cigarette filters can trap chemical carcinogens, they are ineffective against radioactive vapors.

The lungs of a chronic smoker end up with a radioactive lining in a concentration much higher than from residential radon. These particles emit radiation. Smoking two packs of cigarettes a day imparts a radiation dose by alpha particles of about 1, millirem per year. For comparison, the annual radiation dose to the average American from inhaled radon is mrem. In addition, polunium is soluble and is circulated through the body to every tissue and cell in levels much higher than from residential radon.

The proof is that it can be found in the blood and urine of smokers. The circulating polonium causes genetic damage and early death from diseases reminiscent of early radiological pioneers: liver and bladder cancer, stomach ulcer, leukemia, cirrhosis of liver, and cardiovascular diseases.

There are 33 known isotopes atoms of the same element with a different number of neutrons of polonium, and all are radioactive. This element's radioactive instability is what makes it a fitting candidate for use in atomic bombs. When Curie and her husband, Pierre Curie, discovered polonium, they were searching for the source of radioactivity in a naturally occurring, uranium-rich ore called pitchblende.

The two noticed that the unrefined pitchblende was more radioactive than the uranium that had been separated from it. So, they reasoned that the pitchblende must be harboring at least one other radioactive element. The Curies purchased loads of pitchblende so that they could chemically separate the compounds in the minerals. After months of painstaking work, they finally isolated the radioactive element: a substance times more radioactive than uranium, according to the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry IUPAC.

Extracting polonium was challenging because there was such a miniscule amount; 1 ton of uranium ore contains only about micrograms 0. Nonetheless, the Curies were able to pull out the isotope we now know as polonium, according to the Royal Society of Chemistry.

Traces of Po can be found in the soil and air. For example, Po is produced during the decay of radon gas, which a result of decaying radium. In turn, radium is a decay product of uranium , which is present in almost all rocks and soil formed from rocks.

Lichens are able to absorb polonium directly from the atmosphere. In northern areas, people who eat reindeer can have higher concentrations of polonium in their blood, because reindeer eat lichens, according to Smithsonian. Polonium is considered a rare natural element.