This year is the hundred and fiftieth
anniversary of the periodic table. The
classic arrangement of elements
everybody meets in basic chemistry. One
of the many great things about the
periodic table is that each element has
a letter or two that represents it.
For example UConn spells uranium, cobalt,
nitrogen, nitrogen.  We've all probably
heard of uranium before? You can tell
from its spot at the bottom of the
periodic table it's a very large atom
and because it's so big it can bond with
up to 12 other atoms. But have you ever
considered Cobalt?
Cobalt gets its name from Kobold the
German word for goblin. And it's tricky
element as prospectus in Cobalt
Connecticut found in the 18th century
when a vein of cobalt ore was discovered.
Several groups of miners came but
investors always lost interest and each
projects stalled. Cobalt is in the middle
of the periodic table, it's smaller than
uranium so it can only bond with six
other atoms at a time.
It likes to bond with elements like
oxygen, sulfur and arsenic. Which is just
how it was found in the Connecticut vein.
Gold is a similar size but it was until
1989 that a UConn field study found gold
including pure nuggets in plain sight
running parallel to the cobalt! Where the miners hiding something...we may never know?
But we do know about nitrogen it makes up 70% of the air we breath. Nitrogen is
small. It can only bond with up to three
other atoms at a time and it prefers to
bond to itself which is how it's found
in the air and in UConn.  The size of the
elements is only one of the many amazing
facts embodied in the Periodic
Table. The table is one of the crowning
achievements of human thought, a way of
understanding and sorting the universe.
Or well, spelling the universe here's to
another hundred and fifty years!
