Talk:Beryllium

Be 7 decays with electron capture Chemical engineering N magazine says that 7Be can be kept from decaying or switched to radioactive mode with an electron plasma absence of electrons causes halted decay where does the probability go This novel to me mode of switchable radioactivity goes well with the article I mean you could have a near critical mass that would go critical if you switched the power off on the ionized nondecaying Be plasma to create a bomb that goes off absent functioning mechanisms —Preceding unsigned comment added by 169.237.215.179 (talk) 23:05, 26 August 2009 (UTC)

Notes

Article changed over to Wikipedia:WikiProject Elements format by maveric149. Elementbox converted 14:32, 23 Jun 2005 by Femto (previous revision was that of 02:03, 18 Jun 2005).

Information Sources

Some of the text in this entry was rewritten from Los Alamos National Laboratory - Beryllium. Additional text was taken directly from USGS Beryllium Statistics and Information. Other information was obtained from the sources listed on the main page but was reformatted and converted into SI units.

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Talk

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Talk associated with element table development has been moved to Talk:WikiProject Elements

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What's the source for this information? Obviously, the information itself isn't copyrighted. But does that mean that entire factbooks can be copied wholesale? An interesting question.

(Not a legal opinion): To date, facts or collections of facts can't be copyrighted, although there are pernicious efforts to change this. However, the presentation of the facts can be. A particular list of the properties of Beryllium, in a particular order, might well be copyrighted. People have copyrighted facsimile copies of out of copyright books, on the basis of the slight changes that reprinting introduces, but I don't know how successful such attempts are.

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"A particular list of the properties of Beryllium, in a particular order, might well be copyrighted." In that case, I have a concern that the present Beryllium and other similar-formatted articles are copyrighted.

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A more educated legal opinion: the governing authority is USSC Feist v. Rural, a case of one phone directory copying numbers from another. In that case, the court affirmed the doctrine that data itself is beyond copyright and dismissed the case. What copyright covers, they said, is the act of creativity, which can be expressed in terms of selecting which data to express, organizing the data a certain way, or wording it a certain way. In the case of phone book entries, it was ruled that an alphabetical list was about as uncreative as it gets, and so no copyright applied. But in the instant case here, I think we may want to come up with a format of our own (which can't be any worse than the one there any way) and just plug the data into it. This could be done programmatically, though, from the existing text. It's OK to *use* copyrighted material to produce non-infringing material.

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Yeah, I think this isn't that hard to deal with. We can make some modifications to this to be extra-safe.

What is the original source? Perhaps someone can go to another source and confirm the information and add a few more tidbits.

It's just facts, and if someone wants to sue us over something like this, then it will just be good publicity for us and bad publicity for them. (And, by the way, since it is my money at stake, I'm the only one who gets to decide about these risks.)  ;-) --Jimbo Wales

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I've added in some slightly edited berylliosis info taken from the CDC web site. Their copyright notice basically says that if you don't need to login or use a password to see apage, than you're free to use what's on the page. As its a US government site, I assume that means there are no copyright problems about this. Revert the page if I'm wrong -- Malcolm Farmer

Looks fine to me. Thanks for the addition! You needn't worry about the copyright issue - I plan on integrating some OSHA stuff in the same section, which requires me to simplify and rewrite the CDC info anyway -- besides, it probably is public domain and even if it wasn't it would be difficult to defend a copyright on such a small amount of text (especially since it almost certainly was paid for by Joe and Jane Public). Cheers! --User:maveric149

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In the CRC handbook the spin of EE4BE8 is given as zero (as are all EE's), then with an addition the spin of EO4Be9 is given as -3/2. Then with an additional proton, the spin of OO5B10 is given as +3. Is there an explanation for this? WFPMWFPM (talk) 04:04, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

Mega-annum

Cosmogenic Be-10 thereby accumulates at the soil surface, where its relatively long half-life (1.5 million years -- Ma) permits a long residence time before decaying to Be-9.

What does "Ma" mean in this context? I'm assuming not mother, which is where I just redirected ma...

At one time just the Ma was there without the "million years" bit. Ma is shorthand for mega-annum which is Latin for million year. You might also come across Ga which is short for giga-annum. --mav

Berylliosis

I'm quite curious; is there a basic mechanism for berylliosis that is relatively easy to understand or explain, like the mechanism for CO poisoning (subsitution of CO for O2 in respiration), that is relatively easy to explain?--McDogm 03:25, 5 May 2005 (UTC)

Cost

I heard every element has a cost. Anybody know how much Beryllium costs? (68.205.59.91)

Added. Femto 15:18, 9 December 2005 (UTC)

Beryllium-8

Cost: $530/100 grams

= I didn't know there was any stable 4Be8. Maybe youre talking about 4Be9?

Why doesn't the article show the decay mode of Beryllium 8?WFPM (talk) 20:55, 6 November 2010 (UTC)

Because the infobox only shows the most stable isotopes (read the title), and Be-8 is one of the least stable, with half life 6.7(17)×10−17 sec. All the characterized isotopes are listed in isotopes of beryllium, the subarticle.

In Gamow's "a Star called the Sun" he talks about the alpha particles "bouncing against each other", in the context of the Triple alpha process. So they presumably merely return to being 2 independent alpha particles. Which calls into question the feasibility of the Triple alpha process. Did you get a chance to look at the National Geographic May 1985 article showing an artists drawing of the 6C12 nucleus? It would be nice to have a decent concept of its appearance as the result of the triple alpha accumulation process.WFPM (talk) 09:44, 7 November 2010 (UTC)

Astrophysics and fusion physics are the places in physics with a lot of progress, so a book from 1985 might be not up to date?--Stone (talk) 10:32, 7 November 2010 (UTC)

What is at question is the practicality of the Triple alpha process for the creation of 6C12 from 3 alpha particles. And Hans Bethe got a Nobel for the idea of the process. But it's a very unlikely process, with the also highly unstable double alpha to 4Be8 process as an intermediate part of it. And Gamow was one of the authorities at the time. Take a look at the National Geographic May, 1985 article and see what you think.WFPM (talk) 11:13, 7 November 2010 (UTC)I also note your interest in periodic tables, so please take a look at the Janet Periodic table and at my contribution re same at Alternative periodic tables as to the atomic accumulation process.WFPM (talk) 11:55, 7 November 2010 (UTC)

Featured article

I am impressed with this article and suggest we should promote it as a FAC. Any comments?--Light current 11:31, 30 July 2006 (UTC)

jewelry bit removed from article

Removed from article:

Beryllium ore, mined in the west desert of Utah, is prized by jewelry makers for its unique patterning. Also known as "opal flourite," the material can be worked into purple (and other color patterned) jewelry. The ore is known also by the jewelry and gem community as "tiffany stone," a name that references the colorful brecciated patterns that occur in the material. The material is difficult to come by as mining companies not sell it for jewelry purposes but crush the ore into powder.

Seems this doesn't fit here. Should maybe be placed in one of the beryllium mineral pages - whichever one it is referring to, chrysoberyl? ... opal fluorite and tiffany stone don't mean anything to me. Vsmith 01:03, 7 August 2006 (UTC)

10Be deposition

I don't know where the information regarding deposition of 10Be through it's solubility in rainwater comes from , but as far as I know, the main route for 10Be (and 7Be) to be extracted from the atmosphere is through scavenging by sulfate aerosols - predominantly in the stratosphere (not much rain there!). (Lal and Peters, 1967). Sulfate aerosols are also soluble and wet deposition (through clouds and rain) is a dominant mechanism for sulfate removal, but there is a significant component of dry deposition - particularly in very dry conditions (ice sheets etc.).

I was about to mention that normal rainfall has a pH of 5.3. Most rainwater does not have a pH of 5.0 or less, so the statement of "... and most rainwater has a pH less than 5 ..." that is currently in the article is incorrect.

Outside of the United States, Canada, Europe, Japan, and eastern China, there are very few places that see rain with a pH of 5.0 or less. Even in the United States, most of the landmass receives rain that is above a pH of 5. (A map of the lower 48 states: http://nadp.sws.uiuc.edu/isopleths/maps2006/2006Maps.pdf.) In Europe, the area that sees pH of 5.0 or less is roughly a triangular area that is bounded by Britain, Southern Sweden, Austria, and Northern Italy.

Beryllium: Fictional references

Wondering of a small section on popular fiction references to Beryllium, accurate or not, should be made. I can think of two off the top of my head: In the 1996 Doctor Who movie, the Doctor needs to retrieve a beryllium atomic clock, and in the movie Galaxy Quest, the ship is fueled by beryllium spheres (as a parody of Star Trek's dilithium crystals).67.169.63.116 10:16, 10 November 2006 (UTC)

No - especially the accurate or not bit. There exists an article for such trivia - fictional uses of real materials or some such. Vsmith 11:30, 10 November 2006 (UTC)

Added fictional applications of real materials to the see also section. Femto 11:52, 10 November 2006 (UTC)

Yeah applications' - thanks, Vsmith 12:29, 10 November 2006 (UTC)

Besides the mention in the movie GALAXY QUEST, a "beryllium sphere" is also mentioned - as a component of a new kind of nuclear explosive - in the 1994 movie THE SHADOW. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.178.242.140 (talk) 15:58, 29 August 2008 (UTC)

great site

thanks this helped so so much with my science report on beryllium—The preceding unsigned comment was added by 68.77.242.144 (talk • contribs).

Elimination

I do not see anything here which indicates if Beryllium eliminated over time, is it? Jokem 05:11, 23 June 2007 (UTC)

Be-10 decays to... what?

Is ¹⁰Be a neutron emitter or beta emitter (decaying to ¹⁰B)? Dajwilkinson 23:58, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

Beta-minus. [1] Georgewilliamherbert 00:01, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

Is this right? Quoting from the article: "Cosmogenic ¹⁰Be thereby accumulates at the soil surface, where its relatively long half-life (1.51 million years) permits a long residence time before decaying to ¹⁰Be ." ¹⁰Be decays to ¹⁰Be? I'm no chemist, or nuclear physicist, just a student. But that sounds wrong. Imperpay (talk) 04:02, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

It does not say what you wrote: "¹⁰Be decays to ¹⁰Be" . It says "¹⁰Be decays to ¹⁰B" . The "B" rather than "Be" at the end of the sentence refers to Boron. The Boron nucleus has one more unit of nuclear charge than that of Beryllium. In the decay, a neutron changes to a proton, an electron and an electron-antineutrino (to distinguish it from a tau-antineutrino I used the prefix "electron.") The latter two particles exit (the electron or beta-particle and the anti-neutrino). The decay is slow because it is mediated by the weak force and the energy is relatively small.Carrionluggage (talk) 05:37, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

Speed of sound

There are two seemingly equal conditions for speed of sound measurements, yet there are two distinct results. What gives? Slidersv 20:00, 28 October 2007 (UTC)

I have no idea. I could reference the 12870 m/sec figure (wow, mach 37.5, faster than Earth escape v), so I deleted the other, which seems to be corrupted somehow. What does the "n" mean? [2] SBHarris 02:55, 19 December 2007 (UTC)

Semi-protected for a month

Due to the nearly daily IP address vandalism, I have applied semi-protection to the article for a month. If this is causing you problems or you object, feel free to discuss here or on my talk page, or bring it up with any other Wikipedia administrator for review. Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 02:15, 19 December 2007 (UTC)

chlorine —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.21.152.195 (talk) 23:19, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

Have a question

Where does Beryllium get its name from????????/ —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.213.130.185 (talk) 20:07, 24 February 2008 (UTC)

See List of chemical element name etymologies. --Itub (talk) 11:52, 25 February 2008 (UTC)

Beryllium falls slower in a vacuum?

In 1999, my chemistry professor told me that Beryllium falls slower in a vacuum than other elements. I found this interesting and over the years have tried to find more information on this. Has anyone have any further information pro or con?Septagram (talk) 03:56, 2 May 2008 (UTC)

That is not true. In a vacuum, Beryllium falls at the same rate as any other form of matter. Emok (talk) 13:59, 23 June 2008 (UTC)

Origin of beryllium-9

No mention is made of the how the stable beryllium-9 in the universe was created. What I have read in casual articles that most of it is from spallation by cosmic rays, but some, I don't know how much, was formed in the big bang from the fusion of lithium-7 and deuterium. I can't find suitable references for this information. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.4.254.88 (talk) 21:47, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

[3] might help. standard big bang nucleosynthesis (SBBN) is the word to search for. [4] this one is also good. [5] is a review but restricted.--Stone (talk) 22:57, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

You might note that (Except for 7Nitrogen) all the other low Odd Z elements have the majority of their stable isotopes with the A=2Z+1 configuration. This is the opposite of the even Z elements who have a majority in the A=2Z configuration. This argues in favor of the necessity for a balanced configuration of the neutrons in these small atoms as well as for a process where the neutrons can be accumulated to result in the balance.WFPM (talk) 20:39, 7 September 2009 (UTC)

I have edited the title of this section of the talk page to reflect the initial question. A quick read of the article and its talk page does not reveal the origin of beryllium-9 (as pointed out in this section), while lots of information is given on all other isotopes. Since it is by far the most stable element, I think this essential information is missing. I would venture that beryllium-9 comes about by a decay route from one of its isotopes or another unstable isotope. I am no expert, but if any expert reads this and puts in the obvious answer in the article this will greatly help the general reader, I am sure.

Tools for MRI operation?

Seriously? While there's lots of information out there on alloy tools with copper in them, given the strengths of the fields involved and the nature of the equipment, it seems likely that something nonconductive - like specialty plastics - would make a much safer hi-tech screwdriver for poking around at an MRI while it's turned on... No citation yet, so its difficult to read more, tho I would like to. Zaphraud (talk) 02:24, 16 March 2009 (UTC)

Beryllium-10

Article is fully protected.
Please insert link to Beryllium-10 and clear corresponding paragraph. The diagram is not a good example for relation of solar activity / cosmic ray and Be-10 concentration: high activity should give a low Be-10 production rate. Tubas-en (talk) 23:04, 3 April 2009 (UTC)

Some summary info should be left on the main page per WP:SS. Please note the inverted scale for the Be-10; this figure is correct, as it actually does show less Be-10 with higher solar activity. I'll note the funny scale and use it for the Be-10 article also. Welcome to Wikipedia! SBHarris 00:32, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

You are right about the scale!
In my opinion the summary is too extended and the diagram should be placed in Be-10 only. Tubas-en (talk) 19:48, 7 April 2009 (UTC)

Interesting points in lead section

"The toxicity of beryllium and its salts varies greatly from person to person, and elements of its pathology suggest an allergic-type component of the body's reaction to it"

This is unreferenced, and sounds tentative - I've removed it until clarified.FengRail (talk) 18:09, 17 April 2009 (UTC)

also: "It is useful for making non-magnetic alloys" -specifically which ones?

and : "Beryllium dusts can be extremely damaging to the lungs, and the chronic inflammation produced by beryllium lesions can even trigger eventual development of cancer." - reference absolutely necessary.FengRail (talk) 18:11, 17 April 2009 (UTC)

Also can someone clarify the magnetic uses section - is a Be alloy used if so what type?, or is pure Be used?FengRail (talk) 18:36, 17 April 2009 (UTC)

Other problems

"The fact that ⁷Be and ⁸Be are unstable has profound cosmological consequences as it means that elements heavier than beryllium could not be produced by nuclear fusion in the Big Bang"

But triple alpha process seems to say that carbon is produced via Be8.FengRail (talk) 19:14, 17 April 2009 (UTC)

Yes, but the halflife is so short (10^-17 sec) that concentrations of Be-8 are always very low, and so it takes a long time to produce much C-12 this way. There is that time in the core of a star, but none in the big bang, where there is just a few mintues of time between when things too hot to allow existence of nuclei heavier than hydrogen, and when things are too cool and dispersed to allow any more fusion at all. SBHarris 19:37, 17 April 2009 (UTC)

I'm no expert on the big bang, I've removed the "syn" tag - and left the "clarifyme" tag. It's not clear why any Be produced would not be converted to C12 rather than decaying, or is no Be made?

In chemistry the Be would be called a reative intermediate - if the big bang is quick then is it beacuse formation of Be is slow that no heavier nuclei are made - the link between the instability and lack of heavier nucleotides isn't made clear.FengRail (talk) 20:37, 17 April 2009 (UTC)

On reading triple alpha process, it seems to me that the reason for the statement in question is because ⁸Be, formed from two helium nuclei, will spontaneously split back into two helium nuclei in a very short time unless it happens to fuse with a third helium nucleus. So it's not that the formation of ⁸Be is slow; it's that it decays so quickly that the likelihood of a third helium nucleus colliding with it is very low. As a result, to get any significant yield of ¹²C from ⁸Be, a very long "reaction time" is required: much, much longer than the time it took the initial universe to cool to a point where it's no longer hot enough for any fusion to occur at all. Hope this helps.—Tetracube (talk) 21:05, 17 April 2009 (UTC)

ok So Be8 has a short half life (due to its instability) - which means it only exists in small concentration - limiting any further conversion to C12 in the big bang. ??

If that is right then I could change the article to explain that, if someone can confirm that I've got a correct explanation.FengRail (talk) 21:17, 17 April 2009 (UTC)

That's correct, as far as I can tell. But I'm no nuclear scientist, so I'll defer to somebody else to confirm this.—Tetracube (talk) 21:38, 17 April 2009 (UTC)

Elasticity modulus

The article states: "The modulus of elasticity of beryllium is approximately a third greater than that of steel" is unclear and misleading. Steel's modulus is 207 GPa (30 million psi); Be's modulus is 316 GPa (45 million psi). To me, this means Be's modulus is 50% greater than steel's, not "a third greater" since steel is the reference value in the sentence. 66.249.100.228 (talk) 20:03, 12 May 2009 (UTC)

Agreed. "50% greater" is unambiguous, and correct. Since there's two of us, I'll be bold and change it. SBHarris 20:41, 12 May 2009 (UTC)

Typo

In the 2nd paragraph, 2nd sentence, beryllium is misspelled as beryliium: Notable gemstones which contain beryliium include ... 98.164.200.16 (talk) 00:18, 8 June 2009 (UTC)

Thanks ! Fixed. Materialscientist (talk) 00:22, 8 June 2009 (UTC)

In the Applications section, Radiation windows subsection, sentence 2 misspells artifacts. Xiterion (talk) 22:24, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

Oxford dictionary gives artifacts and artefacts as equivalent. Is it a mistake ? Materialscientist (talk) 22:28, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

Beryllium concentration in the earth crust: at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abundance_of_elements_in_Earth%27s_crust are other values, not 4-6 ppm. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.80.119.164 (talk) 20:11, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

Berylliosis

The page is fully locked, but I have a reference for <citation needed> under "Toxicity". Can an editor please add it? The reference supports the statement that berylliosis (aka, chronic beryllium disease) occurred in the fluorescent lamp industry, which caused beryllium to be removed from that industry. The ref is a book chapter, specifically pp 30-33: Breslin AJ. "Exposures and Patterns of Disease in the Beryllium Industry". Chap. 3 in Beryllium: Its Industrial Hygiene Aspects; HE Stokinger, Ed. New York: Academic Press, 1966. Zenithcity (talk) 02:13, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

Added, thank you. Materialscientist (talk) 03:15, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

Add link to Electron Capture in section 2.2?

{{editsemiprotected}} While reading through section 2.2 (nuclear characteristics) I didn't know what decay by electron capture (in the part about ⁷Be) was, and had to search for the appropriate article. Thought it might be worth linking straight to Electron capture rather than just having the plain text. W.stanovsky (talk) 18:51, 14 August 2009 (UTC)

 Done Welcome and thanks for contributing to this article. Celestra (talk) 20:37, 14 August 2009 (UTC)

Truss elements

{{editsemiprotected}} Please add Beryllium to Category:Truss elements. Attinio (talk) 04:32, 21 September 2009 (UTC)

I found no credible source for Truss element and I would not add the category.--Stone (talk) 07:08, 21 September 2009 (UTC)

Category deleted.   Set Sail For The Seven Seas  230° 15' 15" NET   15:21, 21 September 2009 (UTC)

Poisson Ratio of Beryllium

The poisson ratio (ν) for beryllium varies from 0.028~0.032. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 77.49.210.180 (talk) 16:11, 14 November 2009 (UTC)

Occurence

• SPOR MOUNTAIN USGS
• BERYLLIUM USGS
• BERYLLIUM By Brian W. Jaskula
• doi:10.2113/gsecongeo.60.6.1298

What I read from all the ref is that the us holds 65% of the world reserves in Gold Hill, Utah and Spor Mountain , Utah and the Seward Peninsula, Alaska. The US produced 88% of the world production in 2008 and china 10%. Other producers are not existing or hide their production like China and Russia (Stockpile of the USSR). The only mined ore is bertranite in the US. I will try to get it into the article soon. --Stone (talk) 21:29, 16 May 2010 (UTC)

What is the correct melting point

The melting point of Berryllium is in many places reported as 1278±5 º C and many other places as 1287±5 º C The introduction paragraph says 1278C but the information box says 1287C.

In an article:

Journal of Chemical Health and Safety Volume 15, Issue 4, July-August 2008, Pages 26-45 http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jchas.2007.12.003

I found a chart: Cited Physical Properties of Beryllium Metal:

Melting point  1,278; 1,287; 1,284; 1,283

So I think 1287 is correct and would change it myself but the Wikipedia article appears in a June 20 2010 article: column http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/06/20/the-anosognosics-dilemma-1/ by Errol Morris on what we know and don't know. (As an example that he did not know the melting point, then looked on Wikipedia, so now he knows) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Gentlemath (talk • contribs) 02:01, 23 June 2010 (UTC)

OK, I went ahead and changed it --Gentlemath (talk) 18:03, 23 June 2010 (UTC)