Friday 10 April 2009
The Periodic Table
By Cameron Webb
The Periodic Table is simply a way of displaying chemical elements. One of the special things about the periodic table is how it is arraged, elements are listed in order of the increasing atomic number, like the number of protons in the atoms nucleus. Also rows of elements are arranged so that the elements with similar properties fall into the same columns (groups or families).
For example group 1 is Alkali metals, Group 2 are the Alkali Earth Metals, Group 7 are the Halogins, Group 8 are the Nobal Gases and the big group in the middle are the Transition Metals.
In 1869, a Russian chemist named Dmitri Mendeleev came up with a way of organizing the elements-this was obviously the "Periodic Table"
He set them out in order of the weight of the atom, and then grouped them into rows and columns based on their chemical and physical properties. 
One of the things which made it even more incredible is that he was able to place these elements in the periodic table with out the aid of any modern equipment, but what I find quite amusing is that he played a sort of game to place these elements. What he did was he wrote the elements on a piece of card and played a sorting game with them ( thier size, how much electrons it had, stuff like that.) This then led to the shape of the periodic table.
5 Comments:
Who invented the periodic table and why??? :)
A chap from Russia called Demitri Mendeleev invented the periodic table. He did this by listing all the elements known then and then started playing a sort of card game sorting elements into piles according to thier characterisitcs with the elements know then!
The reason why he invented the Periodic table was because he wanted to develop a clean sytem of which elements could be easily accessed by looking at the characteristics , if a metal or a non-metal gas or not a gas, reactive, very reacitve or stable etc. This card game also led to the shape of the periodic table.
Since 1869 advances have been made in the perodic table like the mass number, how many electons orbiting the neucleus of the element.
So from one simple card game led to a universal science language!
Hope this answered your qustion, if not leave another comment!
Cameron
He did it as he and many other scientists before hand had seen patterns emerge between the elements. He wanted to arranged them so that these patterns were visible.
Saul
thank you i learnt this is year six and didn't understand what it was for! :)
Ur welcome
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