Promethium
Promethium:
Depiction of the Greek Titan Prometheus, from whom Promethium derives its name, by Heinrich Füger (Housed at the Princely Collection, Liechtenstein; Image Courtesy Wikicommons).
Facts about Promethium:
- Promethium: Promethium is metallic in nature, and solid at standard temperature and pressure. Salts of Promethium(III) are usually pink in color
- Fun fact about Promethium: Promethium, the last lanthanoid to be discovered, was reported from Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) in 1947 by Marinsky, Glendenin, and Coryell; and named after the legendary Greek Titan at the suggestion of Coryell’s wife.
- Chemical symbol: Pm
- Atomic number: 61
A crystal structure celebrating Promethium:
An organometallic complex of Praseodymium(III). The Praseodymium(III) atoms are represent in sky blue colour.
Facts about this structure:
- Formula: C32 H24 Cl4 N5 O5 Pr
- Structure name: bis(5,7-dichloro-2-methylquinolin-8-olato)-(nitrato)-(4,4′-dimethyl-2,2′-bipyridine)-praseodymium
- Fun fact about the structure: This compound, reported in 2019, shows both in vitro and in vivo anti tumor activity against a specific type of human cancer cells.
- CSD refcode: QIWMER (What’s this?)
- Associated publication: Ting Meng, Qi-Pin Qin, Zi-Lu Chen, Hua-Hong Zou, Kai Wang, Fu-Pei Liang, European Journal of Medicinal Chemistry, 2019, 169, 103, DOI: 10.1016/j.ejmech.2019.02.066
More about Promethium:
Promethium is extremely rare in the earth’s crust and produced artificially in laboratories by nuclear reactions on Uranium. Because of its rare occurrence, the chemistry of Promethium is not that well explored. This, however, does not make Promethium a boring element! Spectra of certain stars in the Andromeda galaxy show signatures of Promethium and the radioactive decay of Promethium has been utilized in designing atomic batteries!
Learn More About the International Year of the Periodic Table (IYPT) in Crystals Project:
This project (#IYPTCrystals) is part of the International Year of the Periodic Table celebration (#IYPT2019), read more about the project here.
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A 3D visualization showing Promethium in real crystal structures: