URANIUM

Most likely the best known member of the f block. Ask anyone if they know what praseodymium or berkelium are, probably they will have no idea. But they probably have some idea of what uranium is or does. Here is a sample of depleted uranium, which in the nuclear industry is essentially leftovers from the enrichment of uranium to make it more fissile. Depleted uranium's radioactive nature is only hazardous if inhaled as dust or directly consumed. But in addition to this, uranium is a toxic and dense metal, making an ampoule within resin a suitable way of keeping this one in captivity.

I don't remember in particular detail many of the days that elements arrived to the collection, but I remember the day uranium arrived. It arrived in a rather sizable box which I still have, lying around, which contained to my memory many packaging peanuts and insulations. On my way to sixth form, in the crisp December morning ... the delivery driver handed over the parcel seemingly oblivious to what it contained. For him it was just a job. For most of the day I was not at home, unable to enjoy the uranium as much as was possible. So that day felt slower than most days as I anticipated the parcel of all parcels that inevitably awaited my presence at home. But the wait was worth it.

Uranium is rather dense - a density similar to gold and tungsten of 19 grams for each cubic centimetre. The piece is not very big but still, it weighs about 1.5 grammes. I think what is really amazing about uranium... not many metals on the periodic table could be said to have changed human history, and usually those which did were discovered a good while before the age when people knew what elements are. The case of uranium is different - it was discovered not thousands of years ago, but a few centuries ago, in a time when the scientific line of thought was becoming more methodical. But in those few centuries, uranium has managed to change the world and the way humanity sees it like only a few metals have. It's done in less than 300 years what some metals have taken thousands of years to do!