Secrets of the Super Elements

Secrets of the Super Elements: Forget oil, coal and gas – a new set of materials is shaping our world and they’re so bizarre they may as well be alien technology. In the first BBC documentary to be filmed entirely on smartphones, materials scientist Prof Mark Miodownik reveals the super elements that underpin our high-tech world.

We have become utterly dependent on them, but they are rare and they’re already running out. The stuff that makes our smartphones work could be gone in a decade and our ability to feed the world depends mostly on a mineral found in just one country. Mark reveals the magical properties of these extraordinary materials and finds out what we can do to save them.

Today our lives depend on just a handful of natural resources but they are not the ones we think they are. Forget about oil, coal and gas, today we depend on a new set of super elements with obscure names like indium and rhenium. They’re properties are so bizarre, they could be confused with an alien technology of sorts.

These super elements are driving innovation, everything from smartphones to MRI scanners but there is a problem they’re rare and they are already running low in supply. The stuff that makes smartphones work could be gone in a decade. The mineral we rely on to feed the world is mostly found in just one country.

We are no reaching the limits on what our planet can provide and we cant simply rely on recycling to rescue us, in order to fix the future we might find that we are forced to mine in space. So what are these super elements and why do we need them so badly? and most importantly what can we do to save them?

Secrets of the Super Elements

Indium

Indium is a chemical element with the symbol In and atomic number 49. The super element is the softest metal that is not an alkali metal. It is a silvery-white metal that resembles tin in appearance. It is a post-transition metal that makes up 0.21 parts per million of the Earth’s crust. The super element has a melting point higher than sodium and gallium, but lower than lithium and tin. Chemically, indium is similar to gallium and thallium, and it is largely intermediate between the two in terms of its properties. The super element was discovered in 1863 by Ferdinand Reich and Hieronymous Theodor Richter by spectroscopic methods. They named it for the indigo blue line in its spectrum. Indium was isolated the next year.

Indium is a minor component in zinc sulfide ores and is produced as a byproduct of zinc refinement. It is most notably used in the semiconductor industry, in low-melting-point metal alloys such as solders, in soft-metal high-vacuum seals, and in the production of transparent conductive coatings of indium tin oxide (ITO) on glass. The super element is considered a technology-critical element.

Rhenium

Rhenium is a chemical element with the symbol Re and atomic number 75. It is a silvery-gray, heavy, third-row transition metal in group 7 of the periodic table. With an estimated average concentration of 1 part per billion (ppb), rhenium is one of the rarest elements in the Earth’s crust. Rhenium has the third-highest melting point and second-highest boiling point of any stable element at 5903 K. Rhenium resembles manganese and technetium chemically and is mainly obtained as a by-product of the extraction and refinement of molybdenum and copper ores. The super element shows in its compounds a wide variety of oxidation states ranging from −1 to +7.

Discovered in 1908, rhenium was the second-last stable element to be discovered (the last being hafnium). It was named after the river Rhine in Europe.

Nickel-based superalloys of rhenium are used in the combustion chambers, turbine blades, and exhaust nozzles of jet engines. These alloys contain up to 6% rhenium, making jet engine construction the largest single use for the element. The second-most important use is as a catalyst: rhenium is an excellent catalyst for hydrogenation and isomerization, and is used for example in catalytic reforming of naphtha for use in gasoline (rheniforming process). Because of the low availability relative to demand, rhenium is expensive, with price reaching an all-time high in 2008/2009 of US$10,600 per kilogram (US$4,800 per pound). Due to increases in rhenium recycling and a drop in demand for rhenium in catalysts, the price of rhenium has dropped to US$2,844 per kilogram (US$1,290 per pound) as of July 2018.