Chemical Forums
Chemistry Forums for Students => Undergraduate General Chemistry Forum => Topic started by: Silverbackman on February 12, 2007, 03:06:13 AM
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Isn't it possible for chemists to synthesize/make gold in the laboratory? By perhaps modifying an elements atomic structure into a gold atom? Say you have any element with an atomic number lower than 79. Could you increase the protons on any lower element until you have gold? Or is there another method to create or synthesize gold in the laboratory?
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Nope, nothing chemically you could do anyways.
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So it would be impossible chemically? Haven't they converted lighter elements into other elements (ie nitrogen to oxygen)? Why couldn't you do it with heavier elements (if lighter elements were possible)?
What other ways could you make/synthesize gold? Would you have to be a laboratory physics (since it deals more with the sub-atomic world while chemistry deals more with substances above the atom level)?
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apparently, Pb-> Au was done in 1980.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alchemy#Nuclear_transmutation
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So it is possible but hard to do on more than one atom at once. I wonder whether there is a way to do it on a far larger scale than one atom.
BTW, would a chemist be able to do nuclear transmutation? Or could a physicist only do it?
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BTW, would a chemist be able to do nuclear transmutation? Or could a physicist only do it?
There is no sharp line between chemists and physicists. Mitch is a chemist, which doesn't stop him from night shifts at cyclotron ;)
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It might also be possible by forcing certain types of nuclear decay for a atom with more protons.
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There is no sharp line between chemists and physicists. Mitch is a chemist, which doesn't stop him from night shifts at cyclotron ;)
As do I my friend, thankfully for me only 4 weeks a year :)
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apparently, Pb-> Au was done in 1980.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alchemy#Nuclear_transmutation
According to Wikipedia, Seaborg was the one who did this. Does anybody know any specific references? I have been curious about that *particular* transformation, it doesn't sound very easy to do, and I wasn't aware that it had ever been done. Going UP in atomic number is often easy, just add neutrons and wait for beta decay. Going down by 3, I'm not sure how to do that. Smash it, I guess, and hope it sometimes comes out like that. Good luck separating the products and getting any kind of yield. And, to feel like I've fulfilled the alchemists dreams and (unprofitably) transmuted lead into gold, I want a golden speck I can see, even in a microscope. Did Seaborg make visible quantities of Au?