![]() When freshly produced, aluminum is highly reactive and reacts spontaneously with water and/or air, instantly forming a thin layer of aluminum oxide (alumina) on its surface. In fact, recycling aluminium takes only 5% of the total energy required to purify aluminium from bauxite. The reactivity pattern of small (-10 to 20 atoms) anionic aluminum clusters with oxygen has posed a long-standing puzzle. Aluminum is an amphoteric metal and can react with both chemically acidic and basic substances. This video shows us how aluminium sheets (we saw how those are created in the previous video) are then formed into aluminium drinks cans:Īnd yes, aluminium is recyclable, too. Visit michaelfreudiger's YouTube channel. This video shows you how refined aluminum bars, or "pigs", are made into large sheets for a variety uses, and also into aluminium foil: Of particular interest is the oxidation of ammonia to dinitrogen, an important half reaction for the potential utilization of ammonia as a fuel or hydrogen carrier. I still can recall the sound of the shift-change whistle at the buttcrack of dawn, which, because I often saw the moon hovering in the sky at the time, I thought was the sound of the moon yawning.Īlmost all metallic aluminium is purified at the industrial scale from bauxite, as you'll see in this video: Metal-metal bonded complexes are promising candidates for catalyzing redox transformations. Bauxite is primarily mined in Ghana, Indonesia, Russia and Surinam and exported to smelters located in Australia, Brazil, Canada, Norway, Russia and the United States - in fact, I lived very close to an aluminium smelter in my early childhood. Aluminum occupies quite a high position in the reactivity series of metals, So it is expected to be very reactive and get corroded readily on exposure to. Like many of the lightweight metals, aluminium is very chemically reactive, so it is not found in nature in its pure state. Aluminium does not react very well with the oxygen in the air but it is in fact quite a reactive metal. I admit I was disappointed by that video, which did not address all the inherent coolness of aluminium, so I dug up a few more videos to provide you with a more complete idea of this amazingly useful element. Combining aluminum with an acid results in a typical single displacement reaction, forming aluminum salt and gaseous hydrogen. ![]() As I learned whilst researching this essay, one of the first statues ever cast in aluminum - the statue of the Anteros - is located in London's Piccadilly Circus, very close to my favourite youth hostel in the world. Aluminum is a malleable, light, silvery-white metal. I am using aluminium foil behind light bulbs to reflect as much light as possible into my aquariums for the plants' benefit. It's the most common metal and the third most abundant element on earth, comprising more than 8 percent of the earth's crust!Īluminium (pictured creative commons 1.0) is fabulously useful and is found in all sorts of items, from drinks cans to shoes for racehorses, from computer and iPhone cases to the body of that crazy experimental Austin "A40 Sports" vehicle. ![]() Okay, here's the element you've all been waiting for: aluminium! Aluminium (or "aluminum" as Americans know it), whose atomic symbol is Al and atomic number is 13, is the first metal we've met so far.
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