On 30 June 1808 Humphrey Davy reported to the Royal Society that he had successfully isolated four new metals, one of which was magnesium. Here are 10 things you might not know about magnesium:
First of all, what is it? It’s a grey-white metal with the symbol Mg and atomic number 12.
Magnesium is the eighth-most-abundant element in the Earth's crust by mass.
The name comes from the Greek word for places in Turkey where the Magnetes tribe lived; either a district in Thessaly called Magnesia or Magnesia ad Sipylum.
Magnesium is the third-most-commonly-used metal for building things, after Iron and Aluminium. As it is less dense than either of these, it’s used a lot in aerospace construction. It was used for German military aircraft as early as World War I, and it was the Germans who first coined the word elektron for a magnesium alloy.
Magnesium has the lowest melting (923 K (650 °C)) and the lowest boiling point (1,363 K (1,090 °C)) of all the alkaline earth metals.
Epsom salts are actually magnesium sulphate. Epsom salts were discovered in 1618 by a farmer in Epsom, Surrey, who noticed that his Cows refused to drink from a particular well because the water tasted bitter. That water did however, have healing properties and the stuff left over when the Water evaporated became known as Epsom salts.
In 1808, Davy used electrolysis on a mixture of magnesia and mercuric oxide to isolate the metal. His suggestion for a name was 'magnium', but the name magnesium is now used in most European languages.
It’s a vital nutrient and plays a role in regulating blood pressure and Heart rate, controlling Blood sugar and the making of DNA and protein. In the UK, the recommended daily values by the Dietary Reference Intake for magnesium are 300 mg for men and 270 mg for women. Spices, nuts, cereals, Cocoa and green, leafy vegetables are good sources of magnesium.
Plants also need it to make cholorophyll.
World production was approximately 1,100 kt in 2017, with the bulk being produced in China and Russia.
No comments:
Post a Comment