All practice pages/Interatomic theory/Elements
Element 78, a transition metal
A precious metal rarer than gold, the catalyst that cleans diesel exhaust, and the core of a widely used cancer drug.
Period 6, group 10. The other transition metals are tinted, and every cell opens its own article.
Like other transition metals, platinum loses its outer s electrons, and often some d electrons as well, to form positive ions, and it can form more than one kind.
Found as native grains and in nickel-copper ores. South Africa's Bushveld Complex supplies about 70% of the world's platinum, with Russia next.
Peoples of pre-Columbian South America worked it into jewelry. Spanish colonists dismissed it as platina, little silver, an annoying impurity in gold, and Antonio de Ulloa described it scientifically in 1748. Its name comes from that Spanish word.
Catalytic converters, especially for diesel vehicles, take the largest share, followed by jewelry and investment bars. Platinum catalysts make nitric acid and refine gasoline, platinum electrodes serve in fuel cells and labs, and cisplatin, a platinum compound, has treated testicular, ovarian and other cancers since the 1970s.