Ytterbium
Name: Ytterbium
Symbol: Yb
Atomic Number: 70
Mass fraction of the earth’s shell: 3,2 x 10 -3 ppm
Melting Point: 824 °C
Boiling Point: 1194°C
Electrical Conductivity: 3,51 x 106 A·V−1·m−1
Name: Ytterbium
Symbol: Yb
Atomic Number: 70
Mass fraction of the earth’s shell: 3,2 x 10 -3 ppm
Melting Point: 824 °C
Boiling Point: 1194°C
Electrical Conductivity: 3,51 x 106 A·V−1·m−1
HISTORY
In 1878, the Swiss chemist Jean Charles Galissard de Marignac found a new element in the earth known as Erbia. Inspired by the site of its discovery near the Swedish town of Ytterby, de Marignac initially named it Ytterbia. Ytterbia became today’s ytterbium when in 1907 the French chemist Georges Urbain divided ytterbia into two components: Neoytterbia and Lutetia. The somewhat unwieldy name Neoytterbium was later shortened to Ytterbium.
It was Wilhelm Klemm and Heinrich Bommer who, in 1936, proclaimed the first extraction of elemental ytterbium. Their successful method reduced ytterbium(III) chloride with potassium at 250 °C. But it was not until 1953 that it was possible to determine ytterbium’s physical and chemical properties.
CHARACTERISTICS & EXTRACTION
The very ductile and soft, silvery-white shiny metal belongs to the rarer elements. It occurs mainly in xenotim, gadolinite, euxenite, and samarskite. Technically, ytterbium is produced after enrichment of the ores. Ytterbium is separated from its “companions” by ion exchange. Ytterbium is now produced by metallothermic reduction of the oxide with cerium or lanthanum and subsequent vacuum distillation.
There is rarely a technical use for ytterbium. It is used as an alloying component for stainless steels, and it is also needed for special catalysts and semiconductors
The isotope Yb works as a gamma radiation source in nuclear medicine. Ytterbium-cobalt-iron-manganese alloys are suitable for particularly high-quality permanent magnets. Lasers are amplified by ytterbium-doped crystals.
