METALS

 Chemists classify an element as a metal based on its properties.

 All of the elements in blue-tinted squares to the left of the zigzag line are metals.

PHYSICAL PROPERTIES OF METAL

1. Shininess
2. Malleability
o material is one that can be hammered or rolled into flat sheets and
other shapes.
3. Ductility
o Ductile material is one that can be pulled out, or drawn, into a long
wire.
4. Conductivity
o Most metals are good conductors
o Most metals are also solids at room temperature.
o However, one metal—mercury (Hg)—is a liquid at room temperature.

CHEMICAL PROPERTIES OF METAL

1. Reactivity
o The ease and speed with which an element combines, or reacts, with
other elements and compounds
o Metals usually react by losing electrons to other atoms.
o Some metals are very reactive.
o For example, you read that sodium (Na) reacts strongly when exposed to
air or water. To prevent a reaction, sodium and metals like it must be
stored under oil in sealed containers.
o By comparison, gold (Au) and platinum (Pt) are valued for their lack of
reactivity and because they are rare.
2. Corrosion
o The reactivities of other metals fall somewhere between those of sodium
and gold.
o Iron, for example, reacts slowly with oxygen in the air, forming iron
oxide, or rust.
o If iron is not protected by paint or plated with another metal, it will
slowly turn to reddish-brown rust.
METALS IN PERIODIC TABLE
 The reactivity of metals tends to decrease as you move from left to right across the
periodic table
A. Alkali Metals (Group 1)
– Li, Na, K, Rb, Cs, Fr
 Alkali metals react with other elements by losing one electron.
 These metals are so reactive that they are never found as uncombined
elements in nature.
 Instead, they are found only in compounds. In the laboratory, scientists have
been able to isolate alkali metals from their compounds.
 As pure, uncombined elements, some of the alkali metals are shiny and so soft
that you can cut them with a plastic knife.
 The two most important alkali metals are sodium and potassium. Sodium
compounds are found in large amounts in seawater and salt beds.
 Another alkali metal, lithium, is used in batteries and some medicines.
B. Alkaline Earth Metals (Group 2)
- Be, Mg, Ca, Sr, Ba, Ra
 fairly hard, gray-white, and a good conductor of electricity.
 Alkaline earth metals react by losing two electrons.
 These elements are not as reactive as the metals in Group 1, but they are more
reactive than most other metals.
 Like the Group 1 metals, the Group 2 metals are never found uncombined in
nature.
 The two most common alkaline earth metals are magnesium and calcium.
 Mixing magnesium and a small amount of aluminum makes a strong but
lightweight material used in ladders, airplane parts, automobile wheels, and
other products.

C. Transition Metals (Group 3)

 Most of the transition metals are hard and shiny.
 All of the transition metals are good conductors of electricity.
 Many of these metals form colorful compounds.
 The transition metals are less reactive than the metals in Groups 1 and 2. This
lack of reactivity is the reason ancient gold coins and jewelry are as beautiful
and detailed today as they were thousands of years ago.
 Even when iron reacts with air and water, forming rust, it sometimes takes
many years to react completely.
 Some transition metals are important to your health. (Iron)

D. Metals in Mixed Groups

 Only some of the elements in Groups 13 through 15 of the periodic table are
metals.
 These metals are not nearly as reactive as those on the left side of the table.
 The most familiar of these metals are aluminum, tin, and lead.
 Aluminum is the lightweight metal used in beverage cans and airplane bodies.
 A thin coating of tin protects steel from corrosion in some cans of food.
 Lead was once used in paints and water pipes. But lead is poisonous, so it is
no longer used for these purposes. Now, its most common uses are in
automobile batteries and weights for balancing tires.

E. Lanthanides
 Two rows of elements are placed below the main part of the periodic table.
 The elements in the top row are called the lanthanides
 Lanthanides are soft, malleable, shiny metals with high conductivity.
 They are mixed with more common metals to make alloys.
 An alloy is a mixture of a metal with at least one other element, usually
another metal.
 Different lanthanides are usually found together in nature.
 They are difficult to separate from one another because they all share very
similar properties.

F. Actinides
 The elements below the lanthanides are called actinides
 only thorium (Th) and uranium (U) occur naturally on Earth.
 Uranium is used to produce energy in nuclear power plants.
 The nuclei of these elements are very unstable, meaning that they break apart
very quickly into smaller nuclei; so unstable that they last for only a fraction of
a second after they are made.
SYNTHETIC METALS
 Elements with atomic numbers higher than 92 are sometimes described as
synthetic elements because they are not found naturally on Earth. Instead,
elements that follow uranium are made—or synthesized—when nuclear particles
are forced to crash into one another.
o For example, plutonium is made by bombarding nuclei of uranium-238
with neutrons in a nuclear reactor.
o Americium-241 (Am-241) is made by bombarding plutonium nuclei with
neutrons.
 To make even heavier elements (with atomic numbers above 95), scientists use
powerful machines called particle accelerators.
o Particle accelerators move atomic nuclei faster and faster until they have
reached very high speeds. If these fast-moving nuclei crash into the nuclei
of other elements with enough energy, the particles can sometimes combine
into a single nucleus.
 Curium (Cm) was the first synthetic element to be made by colliding nuclei.
o In 1940, scientists in Chicago synthesized curium by colliding helium
nuclei with plutonium nuclei.
 In general, the difficulty of synthesizing new elements increases with atomic
number. So, new elements have been synthesized only as more powerful particle
accelerators have been built.
o For example, German scientists synthesized element 112 in 1996 by
accelerating zinc nuclei and crashing them into lead.
 Element 112, like other elements with three-letter symbols, has been given a
temporary name and symbol.
 In the future, scientists around the world will agree on permanent names and
symbols for these elements.

METALLIC BONDING AND ALLOYS

 All metal atoms in the sample contribute
their valence electrons to form a delocalized
electron “sea”.
 The metal “ions” (nuclei with core electrons)
lie in an orderly array within this mobile sea.
 All the atoms in the sample share the
electrons.
 The metal is held together by the attraction
between the metal “cations” and the “sea” of
valence electrons.
PROPERTIES OF METAL

 Metals are generally solids with moderate to high melting points and much higher
boiling points.
 Melting points decrease down a group and increase across a period.
 Metals can be shaped without breaking.
o The electron sea allows the metal ions to slide past each other.

 Metals are good conductors of electricity in both the solid and liquid states.
o The electron sea is mobile in both phases.

 Metals are good conductors of heat.

Why metals dent and bend rather than crack?
 Atoms in pure metal solids are organized in a regular crystal lattice.
 Alloys are similar in structure to pure metal solids, but contain more than one type
of element.
 Alloys are a blend of elements (at least one metal) prepared by mixing molten
constituents and cooling the mixture to produce a solid which exhibits metallic
properties.
Types of Alloy:
1. Intermetallic – alloy with new crystal lattice different from the parent
elements’ lattice structure.
Examples: MgZn2, Na5Zn21, Cu3Zn (definite proportions of constituent
elements)
2. Heterogeneous – alloy without a regular crystal structure throughout the
solid.
Examples: solder, Pb ~50%, Sn ~50%
Multiple phases /crystal structures throughout the solid (i.e., phase
of lead only → phase of tin and lead → phase of tin only)
3. Homogeneous/Metal Solution – alloy with the same crystal lattice structure
as one of the constituent elements
a. Substitutional Alloy – constituents have similar atomic radii and one
can substitute into the crystal lattice structure of another.
Examples: sterling silver (Ag 93%, Cu 7%)
 Atomic radii are within 15% of each other to not affect the
overall crystal structure
 Crystal structure of elements should be the same for least
disruption
 Resulting solid remains malleable, ductile, similar density
b. Interstitial alloy – constituents have different atomic radii and the
smaller fits into interstitial spaces (lattice holes) of another.
Examples: steel (Fe >99%, C <1%)
 Interstitial substituted elements commonly nonmetals (H, B,
C, N, O, Si)
 Resulting solid is more rigid, less malleable, ductile
Alloys typically retain a sea of electrons and so remain conducting. In some cases, alloy
formation alters the chemistry of the surface.
An example is formation of a chemically inert (non-reactive) oxide layer in stainless
steel.