Aluminium and Hans Oersted

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This is what happens when hot
aluminium meets a cold bucket of water.
Photo Credit: Periodic Table
Atomic Number: 13
Relative Mass: 26.98
Group: 13
Period: 3
Block: P
Symbol: Al

Aluminium is a silvery-white metal which is soft and malleable. This metal is the most abundant metal in the Earth's crust at 8.1%. Though it rarely uncombined into it's pure form. Instead it is found within minerals known as Aluminium Silicates.

Hans Oersted and Aluminium's Isolation

Aluminium was discovered in the year 1825 by the Professor of physics - Hans Oersted. Even though he was a physicist, Hans Oersted was drawn to chemistry.
Hans Oersted (Seen in the photo below this paragraph) died 168 years ago on the 9th of March (So this is kind of a death anniversary). He was a Danish physicist as well as a chemist and Hans Oersted found Aluminium. Not just that but, Hans also discovered that an electric current within a wire can deflect a compass needle. This was a phenomenon which proved to be important. It was rapidly recognised and inspired the development of Electromatic theory.

Photo Credit: (On This Day)
Little is known of Hans Oersted's Chemical past other than he had two discoveries. The first, in the year 1820, was of the molecule piperine. Piperine is one of the components of pepper - a very pungent one. It's an alkaloid (a class of natural/organic Nitrogen-containing bases) which forms the taste of pepper.
The other chemical discovery was the isolation of Aluminium. Hans Oersted isolated Aluminium by heating Aluminium Chloride with potassium. However, Hans' Aluminium was still impure. A pure aluminium wasn't found until another chemist Fredrich Wohler perfected Hans Oersted's method. But instead of using potassium like Hans. Fredrich Wohler changed it to Sodium.  

The History of Aluminium

 The earliest time that Aluminium was used happened to be in 3rd Century China. A metal ornament was found within the tomb of Chou-Chu - a military leader. After an analysis of the ornament, the ornament happened to be 85% made out of Aluminium. Yet no one knows how this object was made.
By the end of the 1700s, it was understood that Aluminium Oxide had a metal within. But all attempts to extract the metal was fruitless. In a previous blog post, I mentioned about a chemist named Sir Humphries Davis (Click here for that one). Sir Humphries Davis had used a process known as Electrophoresis to isolate Sodium and Potassium from their ore.

Aluminium's name orginates from the latin name for alum, or 'Alumen', which means a bitter salt.

 Biological Uses

Aluminium has no known biological role. In its ion form of +3, Aluminium is toxic to plants. Though alot of acidic soil make up almost half of the avaliable land capable for plowed and farmed on. This acidity can speed up the release of Al+3 from the plant's minerals. Other crops then absorb the Al+3 leading to a decrease in the lower yield.

We absorb such a small amount of Aluminium from our food. Certain foods have Aluminium concentrations exceding the average. These are tea, processed cheese, lentils and some types of cakes (cooked with a raising agent). 


This photo shows some of the typical uses of
Aluminium. The aeroplane and the crunched
up foil. 
It's Uses

 There is a large range of uses for the metal.
  • Aluminium is used to make a variety of objects such as cans, foil, beer kegs and aeroplane parts. 
    • This is due to Aluminium's properties such as it's low density, non-toxic nature, high thermal conductivity, corrosion resistance and Aluminium's ease of being formed.
    • It is also not magnetic and doesn't spark
  • Often is used as an alloy due to Aluminium's weak strength. Copper, Manganese, Magnesium and Silicon and used mostly due to being lightweight but strong. 
    • Very Important properties in aeroplane construction
  • Often used as electric wires due to Aluminium's conductive property.
    • And... Because Aluminium is cheaper than copper

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