Obscure Elements
Elements28 Sep 2016

Obscure Elements

In the final programme in our Elements series, Justin Rowlatt looks at the rarest and oddest members of the periodic table.

Selenium, bismuth, molybdenum, antimony, rhenium, hafnium, zirconium, tellurium, thallium, barium. What are they? And what are they used for?

Minor metals merchant Anthony Lipmann explains how he made a fortune tracking down a stockpile of one toxic element sufficient to kill millions of people - and sold it to Japanese camera manufacturers.

We set chemistry professor Andrea Sella a musical challenge to round off his elucidation of the periodic table, going out with a pyrotechnic bang.

And cosmologist Martin Rees explains why 85% of the matter in the universe isn't made up of chemical elements at all, but instead of "dark matter", whatever that is.

(Picture: Elements series planning board; Credit: Laurence Knight/BBC)

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Avsnitt(65)

Cadmium (Cd)

Cadmium (Cd)

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25 Maj 201630min

Potassium (K)

Potassium (K)

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Hydrogen (H) - energy

Hydrogen (H) - energy

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10 Maj 201629min

Zinc (Zn)

Zinc (Zn)

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Hydrogen (H) - water (part 2)

Hydrogen (H) - water (part 2)

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27 Apr 201630min

Hydrogen (H) - water (part 1)

Hydrogen (H) - water (part 1)

Northwest India is fast running out of groundwater. As much of the world faces growing water scarcity, will mass migration and water conflicts become inevitable? Do we take water for granted at our pe...

20 Apr 201630min

Noble Gases (Ar, Ne, Kr, Xe)

Noble Gases (Ar, Ne, Kr, Xe)

Neon, argon, krypton and xenon: Laurence Knight investigates their uses, from the blinding light of the arc welder's torch to the dying trade of the neon sign-making. Professor Andrea Sella explains h...

23 Mars 201629min

Germanium (Ge)

Germanium (Ge)

Nanotech, virtual reality, Moore's Law - we look at germanium, the substance that could oust the silicon from Silicon Valley, and one day help computers supercede your brain. IBM's head of innovation,...

16 Mars 201629min

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