#arrhenius

A Newspaper Publication in 1912 Predicting the Effect of Burning Coal on the Warming of the Planet.

The idea of the Greenhouse Effect goes back even further than this - and in fact, is something that we should all be thankful for as without Greenhouse Gases, the Earth would be a chilly -14C (0F).

Joseph Fourier, known for his famous Fourier Transform as well as his theories of heat exchange, questioned why it is that the Earth stays warm even when the Sun has set for the night. If the Sun was the only source of heat, wouldn't it rapidly become unbearably cold? This was all the way back in 1822.

Island of the Rare Earths

In the 1700s, there was a mine on an island called Resarö, about 15 km north of Sweden’s capital city of Stockholm. At the time, the mine was pulling a type of feldspar out of the ground for making porcelain, useful for stoves and furnaces in Sweden. The mine was named for the local community, the Ytterby mine.

In 1787, a Swedish Army Lieutenant named Carl Axel Arrhenius who had a background in chemistry recognized that there was something odd about one of the dark black rocks at this site. He collected a sample of the rock, named it “ytterbite” since it was discovered at the Ytterby quarry and sent it off to several professors including Johan Gadolin at Åbo University.

Professor Gadolin isolated some components from the rock and realized that he was dealing with an element that had not been previously characterized. He named the compound “Ytterbia” and published its discovery as a newly-characterized element.

However, this rock was more complicated. Half a century later, another scientist named Carl Gustav Mosander worked on the same material and realized that there was more than 1 element t here. He was able to split the ytterbite into 4 different elements at the time, each with slightly different properties.

As this was before the periodic table of elements was created, they had no way of knowing that they were dealing with the Rare Earth Elements – the uppermost of the rows at the very bottom of the periodic table. These elements are very similar in their chemistry – they make the same type of ions and their sizes are only slightly different, so the elements follow each other quite well. The original ytterbite rock collected by Arrhenius was rich in all the rare earth elements; they just had to be isolated.

Eventually those four piles of elements were broken up again and a total of 10 different chemical elements were isolated from this single rock sample. Today, the legacy of this mine is buried within the names on the Periodic Table. Ytterbium comes directly from the name of the mine, and terbium, erbium, and yttrium were all split by Mosander. Gadolinium was later named for professor Gadolin, Holmium is named after Stockholm, and scandium and thulium were named after Scandanavia (Thule).

So, the next time you struggle to pronounce the name of one of the elements at the bottom of the periodic table, pause for a moment and think about Sweden. Our modern society uses those elements heavily in batteries and electronics, so they both made the electronics age possible and made a small part of it a little bit difficult for me to memorize.

-JBB

Image credits: https://flic.kr/p/91kyGh

http://bit.ly/1cwN5Av

Read more: http://bit.ly/1Pvq250

http://www.vanderkrogt.net/elements/rareearths.php

http://pubs.acs.org/doi/pdf/10.1021/ed078p1343

Timelines. Greenhouse Affect #12. January 3rd, 2019.

Global warming hasn’t been a new idea for over a hundred years.

Svante Arrhenius was the first scientist to quantify how levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere could affect the surface temperature of the earth.  Like Tyndall and Fourier, Arrhenius used the metaphor of a greenhouse to explain how the atmosphere traps heat.  He predicted that doubling the CO2 in the atmosphere would raise the average temperature by about 4 degrees Celsius, a reasonably close estimate by today’s standards.  He was also the first to link human activity to the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.

It is interesting to note that Arrhenius did not see this warming effect as a cause for concern.  Instead, he thought it would keep the world safe from another ice age.

Is it probable that we shall in the coming geological ages be visited by a new ice period that will drive us from our temperate countries into the hotter climates of Africa? There does not appear to be much ground for such an apprehension. The enormous combustion of coal by our industrial establishments suffices to increase the percentage of carbon dioxide in the air to a perceptible degree.

Svante Arrhenius (1859-1927). Worlds in the Making: The Evolution of the Universe. New York; London: Harper, 1908. MU Depository 113 Ar69 Read online

Story Post

Sydryn called Camilo and Rheni into their office about a week after the incident. Before discussing anything, they examined Camilo to determine whether or not the miscarriage was complete. After concluding that it was, the doctor had the couple pull up a chair at their desk to talk about it. “First, I'd just like to say that my colleagues have pointed out that I can come off as insensitive when dealing with sensitive matters,” Sydryn said. “While I don’t much believe in sugar coating things, I do want you to know that I am capable of sympathy and mean no harm should I not tread lightly enough on the subject matter we are to discuss.”

Preg Rheni Speedpaint

I livestreamed this piece earlier but barely anyone came to watch so I’ve uploaded a recording! If you’ve wondered about my process, here is a Speedpaint with shitty music because I don’t like silent videos of Pregnant Rheni from my Mayternity event. I didn’t start the stream until I had the basic sketching done, so this isn’t recorded right from scratch. Enjoy!