I am now two weeks in to my Fellowship at The Chemical Heritage Foundation in Philadelphia, PA, and it has already been an amazing experience. Being exposed to an academic world that is not normally part of my day-to-day routine is itself an extraordinary privilege, but coupling that with the astonishing collections at CHF I feel truly honored.
I’m here at the kind invitation of the CHF and the Société de Chimie Industrielle (American Section) Fellowship, in order to research a children’s book about the discovery of the chemical elements. At the end of the project it is my intention to have a manuscript that is ready for publication, that catalogs the discovery of all of the 114, currently named elements written for a junior audience.
As I conduct my research I intend to publish a series of tweets about each element to whet the appetite for my ultimate audience. I will be using the hashtag #dingleelements. Why not click on the link to see what I have tweeted so far?
In addition to the ‘live’ tweets, I will replicate and collect all of those tweets on this page about once every week. Here I will list those tweets alphabetically according to the element they refer to, but on Twitter they will appear in a random order. Please RT and check back here for updates.
| Symbol | Name | Atomic Number | Tweet |
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| Ac | Actinium | 89 | |
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| Al | Aluminum | 13 | |
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| Am | Americium | 95 | |
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| Sb | Antimony | 51 | |
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| Ar | Argon | 18 | Ramsay to Rayleigh, 5/24/1894; “Has it occurred to you…” |
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| As | Arsenic | 33 | |
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| At | Astatine | 85 | |
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| Ba | Barium | 56 | |
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| Bk | Berkelium | 97 | |
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| Be | Beryllium | 4 | |
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| Bi | Bismuth | 83 | |
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| Bh | Bohrium | 107 | |
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| B | Boron | 5 | |
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| Br | Bromine | 35 | Justus von Liebig (yeah, the condenser guy) *should* have discovered bromine, but he screwed up! |
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| Cd | Cadmium | 48 | |
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| Ca | Calcium | 20 | |
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| Cf | Californium | 98 | |
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| C | Carbon | 6 | |
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| Ce | Cerium | 58 | |
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| Cs | Cesium | 55 | |
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| Cl | Chlorine | 17 | |
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| Cr | Chromium | 24 | |
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| Co | Cobalt | 27 | |
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| Cu | Copper | 29 | |
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| Cn | Copernicium | 112 | Copernicium and #71 have a link, and it’s not ‘chemical’ per se. |
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| Cm | Curium | 96 | |
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| Ds | Darmstadtium | 110 | |
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| Db | Dubnium | 105 | |
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| Dy | Dysprosium | 66 | |
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| Es | Einsteinium | 99 | |
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| Er | Erbium | 68 | |
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| Eu | Europium | 63 | |
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| Fm | Fermium | 100 | Enrico Fermi missed being 1st living person to have element named after him by just a few months |
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| Fl | Flerovium | 114 | |
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| F | Fluorine | 9 | |
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| Fr | Francium | 87 | |
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| Gd | Gadolinium | 64 | |
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| Ga | Gallium | 31 | |
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| Ge | Germanium | 32 | |
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| Au | Gold | 79 | |
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| Hf | Hafnium | 72 | |
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| Hs | Hassium | 108 | |
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| He | Helium | 2 | |
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| Ho | Holmium | 67 | |
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| H | Hydrogen | 1 | |
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| In | Indium | 49 | |
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| I | Iodine | 53 | |
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| Ir | Iridium | 77 | |
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| Fe | Iron | 26 | |
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| Kr | Krypton | 36 | |
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| La | Lanthanum | 57 | |
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| Lr | Lawrencium | 103 | |
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| Pb | Lead | 82 | |
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| Li | Lithium | 3 | |
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| Lu | Lutetium | 71 | |
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| Mg | Magnesium | 12 | |
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| Mn | Manganese | 25 | |
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| Mt | Meitnerium | 109 | |
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| Md | Mendelevium | 101 | |
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| Hg | Mercury | 80 | |
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| Mo | Molybdenum | 42 | |
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| Nd | Neodymium | 60 | |
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| Ne | Neon | 10 | |
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| Np | Neptunium | 93 | |
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| Ni | Nickel | 28 | |
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| Nb | Niobium | 41 | |
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| N | Nitrogen | 7 | |
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| No | Nobelium | 102 | Nobelium kept the original name given to it, even though those 1st ‘discoverers’ were mistaken |
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| Os | Osmium | 76 | |
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| O | Oxygen | 8 | |
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| Pd | Palladium | 46 | |
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| P | Phosphorus | 15 | |
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| Pt | Platinum | 78 | |
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| Pu | Plutonium | 94 | |
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| Po | Polonium | 84 | |
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| K | Potassium | 19 | |
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| Pr | Praseodymium | 59 | |
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| Pm | Promethium | 61 | |
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| Pa | Protactinium | 91 | |
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| Ra | Radium | 88 | |
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| Rn | Radon | 86 | |
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| Re | Rhenium | 75 | |
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| Rh | Rhodium | 45 | |
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| Rg | Roentgenium | 111 | |
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| Rb | Rubidium | 37 | |
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| Ru | Ruthenium | 44 | |
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| Rf | Rutherfordium | 104 | |
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| Sm | Samarium | 62 | |
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| Sc | Scandium | 21 | |
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| Sg | Seaborgium | 106 | |
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| Se | Selenium | 34 | |
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| Si | Silicon | 14 | If silicon were a metal, maybe it *would* have been called silicium as Davy suggested in 1808 |
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| Ag | Silver | 47 | |
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| Na | Sodium | 11 | |
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| Sr | Strontium | 38 | |
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| S | Sulfur | 16 | |
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| Ta | Tantalum | 73 | |
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| Tc | Technetium | 43 | |
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| Te | Tellurium | 52 | |
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| Tb | Terbium | 65 | |
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| Tl | Thallium | 81 | |
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| Th | Thorium | 90 | |
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| Tm | Thulium | 69 | |
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| Sn | Tin | 50 | |
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| Ti | Titanium | 22 | |
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| W | Tungsten | 74 | |
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| Uub | Ununbium | 112 | |
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| Uuh | Ununhexium | 116 | |
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| Uuo | Ununoctium | 118 | |
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| Uup | Ununpentium | 115 | |
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| Uuq | Ununquadium | 114 | |
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| Uus | Ununseptium | 117 | |
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| Uut | Ununtrium | 113 | |
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| U | Uranium | 92 | |
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| V | Vanadium | 23 | |
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| Xe | Xenon | 54 | |
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| Yb | Ytterbium | 70 | |
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| Y | Yttrium | 39 | |
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| Zn | Zinc | 30 | |
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| Zr | Zirconium | 40 | |
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Lucky you! What a wonderful opportunity to spend time in the goldmine of chemistry knowledge! I look forward to reading your stories.