Did You Know?

Did you know that Indium is about as abundant as silver in the earth’s crust at 0.1 ppm?

As a pure metal indium emits a high-pitched "cry" when it is bent.
One unusual property of indium is that its most common isotope is very slightly radioactive; it very slowly decays by beta emission to tin over time. This radioactivity is not considered hazardous, mainly because its decay rate is nearly 50,000 times slower than that of natural thorium, with a half-life of 4 x 1010 years; many thousands of times longer than the estimated age of the universe. Also, indium is not a notorious cumulative poison, like its neighbor cadmium, and is relatively rare.
This soft, malleable and easily fusible poor metal, is chemically similar to aluminium or gallium but looks more like zinc (zinc ores are also the primary source of this metal).
Its current primary application is to form transparent electrodes from Indium tin oxide in liquid crystal displays. It is also widely used in thin-films to form lubricated layers (during World War II it was widely used to coat bearings in high-performance aircraft).
One unusual property of indium is that its most common isotope is very slightly radioactive; it very slowly decays by beta emission to tin over time. This radioactivity is not considered hazardous, mainly because its decay rate is nearly 50,000 times slower than that of natural thorium, with a half-life of 4 x 1010 years; many thousands of times longer than the estimated age of the universe. Also, indium is not a notorious cumulative poison, like its neighbor cadmium.
Indium (named after the indigo line in its atomic spectrum) was discovered by Ferdinand Reich and Hieronymous Theodor Richter in 1863 while they were testing zinc ores with a spectrograph in search of thallium. It is interesting to note that most elements were discovered while searching for other elements. Richter went on to isolate the metal in 1867.
Did you know that the Agency for Toxic Substances ad Disease Registry ranks Lead as the second most hazardous substances on the planet!!

Here are the most dangerous 5:

1. ARSENIC
2. LEAD
3. MERCURY
4. VINYL CHLORIDE
5. POLYCHLORINATED BIPHENYL