Occurrence, uses, and properties.
Strontium is a soft metal like lead and, when freshly cut, has a silvery lustre. It rapidly reacts in air to take on a yellowish colour; therefore, it is stored in kerosene. It does not occur free in nature. It composes about 0.04 percent of the crust of the Earth, especially as the minerals strontianite (the carbonate) and celestite (the sulfate).
Adair Crawford and William Cruikshank first detected (1790) the element in strontianite found at Strontian in Argyll, Scot. The metal was isolated (1808) by Sir Humphry Davy, who electrolyzed a mixture of the moist hydroxide or chloride with mercuric oxide, using a mercury CAThode, and then evaporated the mercury from the resultant amalgam. Strontium may be obtained in the form of sticks by the contact CAThode method of electrolysis, in which a cooled iron rod, acting as a CAThode, just touches the surface of a fused mixture of potassium and strontium chlorides and is raised as the strontium solidifies on it. Because calcium and barium, which it resembles closely, occur in much greater abundance, strontium metal is not produced in commercially important quantities. The metal is malleable and ductile and a good conductor of electricity.
The four naturally occurring isotopes in the order of their abundance are: strontium-88 (82.56 percent), strontium-86 (9.86 percent), strontium-87 (7.02 percent), and strontium-84 (0.56 percent). About 16 artificial isotopes have been produced by nuclear reactions, of which the longest-lived is strontium-90 (approximately 28-year half-life). This isotope, formed by nuclear explosions, is considered the most dangerous constituent of fallout. Strontium can replace some of the calcium in foods and ultimately become concentrated in bones and teeth, where it continues ejecting electrons that cause radiation injury. Controlled amounts of radioactive strontium have been used as a treatment for bone cancer. The heat of its radioactive decay also can be converted to electricity for long-lived, lightweight power sources in navigation buoys, remote weather stations, space vehicles, etc.
History
Magnesium, calcium, strontium, and barium--elements derived from alkaline earths--were isolated as impure metals by Sir Humphry Davy in 1808 by means of the electrolytic method he had previously used for isolating the alkali metals potassium and sodium. The alkaline-earth metals were later produced by reduction of their salts with free alkali metals, and it was in this way (the action of potassium on beryllium chloride) that beryllium was first isolated by the German chemist Friedrich Wöhler and the French chemist Antoine Bussy independently in 1828. Radium was discovered in 1898 by means of its radioactivity by Pierre and Marie Curie, who separated it from barium.
Chemical compounds
In its compounds strontium has an exclusive oxidation state of +2, as the Sr2+ ion. It is an active reducing agent and readily reacts with halogens, oxygen, and sulfur to yield halides, oxide, and sulfide.
Strontium compounds have rather limited commercial value because corresponding calcium and barium compounds serve the same purpose yet are cheaper. A few, however, have found appliCATion in industry and elsewhere. Strontium nitrate, Sr(NO3)2, and strontium chlorate, Sr(ClO3)2, are extremely volatile and impart a brilliant crimson colour to flames; they are thus used in various pyrotechnic devices, flares, and tracer bullets. Strontium hydroxide, Sr(OH)2, is sometimes used to extract sugar from molasses because it forms a soluble saccharide from which the sugar can be easily regenerated by the action of carbon dioxide. Strontium monosulfide, SrS, is employed as a depilatory and in some luminous paints.
atomic number 38 atomic weight 87.62 melting point 769 C boiling point 1,384 C specific gravity 2.54 valence 2 electronic config. 2-8-18-8-2 or (Kr)5s2
Reference: Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc. 1994-2000 ©
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