Astatine - Tales from the Periodic Table
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- Опубліковано 3 жов 2024
- The 85th element in the periodic table, Astatine, is a member of the halogen group that includes Fluorine, Chlorine, Bromine, and Iodine, but due to its rarity and highly radioactive nature, many of its properties remain unknown. Astatine has an interesting history leading to its discovery. It has virtually no applications aside from some possible uses as a "targeted alpha therapy" for cancer.
I find short lived elements like astatine and francium quite interesting as we don’t really have a single clue of what they look like. I like to speculate on what elements like those would look like if we could get enough atoms of them together to have macroscopic amounts ignoring the fact that the immensely high temperatures resulting from their radioactive decay would immediately cause the elements to vaporize themselves. 🔥
I've had to rely more on talking about the history of discovery, than on it applications (something I think we'll see more and more. Still, I find the histories fascinating as well.
Ron
I have to say this is the best explanation of radioactive decay with the example of Uranium I have ever listened to.
Thank you
Wow, thank you! And happy 100th birthday Mr. President!
Ron
Great video it was both interesting and well delivered
Thank you kindly!
Ron
By the way, lead 209 isn't stable; it decays to bismuth by beta decay. I hadn't realized actinium had been used in cancer therapy (and its daughter isotopes). I always though it, and francium were totally useless but there they are giving off alpha particles and killing cancer. Astatine was also tried as a treatment for thyroid cancer since it is so chemically similar to iodine but enough goes elsewhere (liver and kidneys from your pictures) that it caused problems.
Syd,
Right you are. Lead 209 has a half-life of 3.235 hours.(But it IS naturally occurring...) How did I mess THAT up? Thanks for catching my error.
Ron
Very interesting, and well done! Thank you! Very interesting would also be your opinion on 'the Island of stability'
@jfkastner ,
I guess I don't have any opinions about the "Island of Stability" beyond it being an interesting theoretical possibility. Wikipedia has a nice article open it Here:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Island_of_stability
For those who have never heard about this, it has been proposed there are isotopes of superheavy elements which may be more stable than the elements before them in the periodic table. Elements above the more-stable elements are less stable, hence an "island of stability". These isotopes (around Copernicium and Flerovium) have not yet been created to explore their properties. Stay tuned!
Ron
@@ronhipschman Thank you. I'm kind'a skeptical, we could have detected some super heavy stable Atoms in Cosmic Ray Detectors etc, but who knows? WIMPs maybe?
Hey I imagine most of us watching know the basics of physics. This isn't the discovery channel
Interesting (though I may respectfully disagree with your premise). How would you suggest I change things? Please take into account that although I do repeat things in each video, I want all the videos to stand on their own. I apologize if this makes them seem repetitive when watching multiple episodes. I'm interested in your opinion. Thanks for watching.
Ron
PS. If this WERE the Discovery Channel, I might have a budget over $0 to produce these. Wouldn't it be great to have videos and interviews of people and places where these elements are mined, refined, and used? And maybe have a chemist who can show some of the reactions the elements take part in? You out there listening Discovery?
Sounds too poloshed to be a real human voice...
Um, I'll take that as a compliment? If you could hear the raw unedited version of my videos, you may have a different opinion!
(I assume you meant "polished"...) So, thanks!
Ron