ABOUT THE BOOK

In this book we shall describe how the alphabet of chemistry has been designed and how the inquisitive mind of the researchers discovered new chemical elements, one after another.

The history of chemical elements begins with their discovery. Although hefty volumes in which elements are described in detail pay very little attention to their discoveries, they are a major part of the history of human knowledge.

Each element has its own “biography”, interesting in its own way. The history of the discovery of many elements has not yet been exhaustively studied and quite a number of unclear issues should be cleared by historians of chemistry. Perhaps you will be one of them…

CONTENTS

PART 1 - ELEMENTS DISCOVERED IN NATURE

1. Elements Known in Antiquity

2. Elements Discovered in the Middle Ages

3. Elements of Air and Water

4. Elements Discovered by Chemical Analysis, 5. Elements Discovered by the Electrochemical Method, 6. Elements Discovered by the Spectroscopic Method

7. Rare Earths

8. Helium and Other Inert Gases

9. Elements Predicted from the Periodic System

10. Hafnium and Rhenium—Two Stable Elements Which Were the Last to Be Discovered

11. Radioactive Elements

PART 2 - SYNTHESIZED ELEMENTS

12. Discoveries of Synthesized Elements Within the Old Boundaries of the Periodic System

13. Transuranium Elements