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Cryolite
Cryolite ( Na3 Al F6, sodium hexafluoroaluminate) is an uncommon mineral identified with the once-large deposit at Ivittuut on the west coast of Greenland, mined commercially until 1987. History Cryolite was first described in 1798 by Danish veterinarian and physician Peder Christian Abildgaard (1740–1801); it was obtained from a deposit of it in Ivigtut (old spelling) and nearby Arsuk Fjord, Southwest Greenland. The name is derived from the Greek language words ''κρύος'' (cryos) = frost, and ''λίθος'' (lithos) = stone. The Pennsylvania Salt Manufacturing Company used large amounts of cryolite to make caustic soda and fluorine compounds, including hydrofluoric acid at its Natrona, Pennsylvania works, and at its integrated chemical plant in Cornwells Heights, Pennsylvania, during the 19th and 20th centuries. It was historically used as an ore of aluminium and later in the electrolytic processing of the aluminium-rich oxide ore bauxite (itself a combination of aluminiu ...
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Cryolite Mine Ivgtut Greenland
Cryolite ( Na3 Al F6, sodium hexafluoroaluminate) is an uncommon mineral identified with the once-large deposit at Ivittuut on the west coast of Greenland, mined commercially until 1987. History Cryolite was first described in 1798 by Danish veterinarian and physician Peder Christian Abildgaard (1740–1801); it was obtained from a deposit of it in Ivigtut (old spelling) and nearby Arsuk Fjord, Southwest Greenland. The name is derived from the Greek language words ''κρύος'' (cryos) = frost, and ''λίθος'' (lithos) = stone. The Pennsylvania Salt Manufacturing Company used large amounts of cryolite to make caustic soda and fluorine compounds, including hydrofluoric acid at its Natrona, Pennsylvania works, and at its integrated chemical plant in Cornwells Heights, Pennsylvania, during the 19th and 20th centuries. It was historically used as an ore of aluminium and later in the electrolytic processing of the aluminium-rich oxide ore bauxite (itself a combination of aluminiu ...
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Sodium Hexafluoroaluminate
Sodium aluminium hexafluoride is an inorganic compound with formula Na3 Al F6. This white solid, discovered in 1799 by Peder Christian Abildgaard (1740–1801), occurs naturally as the mineral cryolite and is used extensively in the industrial production of aluminium metal. The compound is the sodium (Na+) salt of the hexafluoroaluminate (AlF63−) ion. Production Most cryolite is manufactured by a variety of related pathways. One route entails combining sodium aluminate and hydrofluoric acid: :Na3Al(OH)6 + 6 HF → Na3AlF6 + 6 H2O Other routes include: : : Often the hexafluorosilicic acid, which is recovered from phosphate mining, is the precursor in a two-step process beginning with neutralization with ammonia to give ammonium hexafluorosilicate: :H3AlF6 + 3NH3 → (NH4)3AlF6 :(NH4)3AlF6 + 3NaOH → Na3AlF6 + 3NH3 + 3H2O The mineral form of sodium hexafluoroaluminate, which is called cryolite, was mined at Ivigtût on the west coast of Greenland until ...
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Fluorine
Fluorine is a chemical element with the symbol F and atomic number 9. It is the lightest halogen and exists at standard conditions as a highly toxic, pale yellow diatomic gas. As the most electronegative reactive element, it is extremely reactive, as it reacts with all other elements except for the light inert gases. Among the elements, fluorine ranks 24th in universal abundance and 13th in terrestrial abundance. Fluorite, the primary mineral source of fluorine which gave the element its name, was first described in 1529; as it was added to metal ores to lower their melting points for smelting, the Latin verb meaning 'flow' gave the mineral its name. Proposed as an element in 1810, fluorine proved difficult and dangerous to separate from its compounds, and several early experimenters died or sustained injuries from their attempts. Only in 1886 did French chemist Henri Moissan isolate elemental fluorine using low-temperature electrolysis, a process still employed for modern pr ...
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Ivittuut
Ivittuut (formerly, Ivigtût) (Kalaallisut: "Grassy Place") is an abandoned mining town near Cape Desolation in southwestern Greenland, in the modern Sermersooq municipality on the ruins of the former Norse Middle Settlement. Ivittuut is one of the few places in the world so far discovered to have naturally occurring cryolite (Na3AlF6, sodium aluminum fluoride), an important agent in modern aluminum extraction. History The area was settled by about twenty farms of Norsemen, a district called the "Middle Settlement" by modern archaeologists from its placement between the larger Western and Eastern Settlements. It is the smallest and least well known of the three, and no written records of its residents survive, for which reasons it is believed to have been established last (and abandoned first) of the three. Investigations show a presence after 985 and with occupation continuing up to at least the 14th century. The town's cryolite deposit was discovered in 1799, and t ...
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Aluminium
Aluminium (aluminum in American and Canadian English) is a chemical element with the symbol Al and atomic number 13. Aluminium has a density lower than those of other common metals, at approximately one third that of steel. It has a great affinity towards oxygen, and forms a protective layer of oxide on the surface when exposed to air. Aluminium visually resembles silver, both in its color and in its great ability to reflect light. It is soft, non-magnetic and ductile. It has one stable isotope, 27Al; this isotope is very common, making aluminium the twelfth most common element in the Universe. The radioactivity of 26Al is used in radiodating. Chemically, aluminium is a post-transition metal in the boron group; as is common for the group, aluminium forms compounds primarily in the +3 oxidation state. The aluminium cation Al3+ is small and highly charged; as such, it is polarizing, and bonds aluminium forms tend towards covalency. The strong affinity tow ...
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Greenland
Greenland ( kl, Kalaallit Nunaat, ; da, Grønland, ) is an island country in North America that is part of the Kingdom of Denmark. It is located between the Arctic and Atlantic oceans, east of the Canadian Arctic Archipelago. Greenland is the world's largest island. It is one of three constituent countries that form the Kingdom of Denmark, along with Denmark and the Faroe Islands; the citizens of these countries are all citizens of Denmark and the European Union. Greenland's capital is Nuuk. Though a part of the continent of North America, Greenland has been politically and culturally associated with Europe (specifically Norway and Denmark, the colonial powers) for more than a millennium, beginning in 986.The Fate of Greenland's Vikings
, by Dale Mackenzie Brown, ''Archaeological Institute of America'', ...
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Halide Mineral
Halide minerals are those minerals with a dominant halide anion (, , and ). Complex halide minerals may also have polyatomic anions. Examples include the following: *Atacamite * Avogadrite (K,Cs)BF *Bararite (β) *Bischofite * Brüggenite *Calomel *Carnallite *Carnallite * Cerargyrite/Horn silver AgCl * Chlorargyrite AgCl, bromargyrite AgBr, and iodargyrite AgI *Cryolite *Cryptohalite (a) Vanadates), 09 Silicates: * ''neso-'': insular (from Greek , "island") * ''soro-'': grouped (from Greek , "heap, pile, mound") * ''cyclo-'': ringed (from Greek , "circle") * ''ino-'': chained (from Greek , "fibre", rom Ancient Greek * ''phyllo-'': sheeted (from Greek , "leaf") * ''tecto-'': of three-dimensional framework (from Greek , "of building") ;Nickel–Strunz code scheme ''NN.XY.##x'': * ''NN'': Nickel–Strunz mineral class number * ''X'': Nickel–Strunz mineral division letter * ''Y'': Nickel–Strunz mineral family letter * ''##x'': Nickel–Strunz mineral/group n ...
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Hydrofluoric Acid
Hydrofluoric acid is a Solution (chemistry), solution of hydrogen fluoride (HF) in water. Solutions of HF are colourless, acidic and highly Corrosive substance, corrosive. It is used to make most fluorine-containing compounds; examples include the commonly used pharmaceutical antidepressant medication fluoxetine (Prozac) and the material polytetrafluoroethylene, PTFE (Teflon). Elemental fluorine is produced from it. It is commonly used to Etching (microfabrication), etch glass and silicon wafers. Uses Production of organofluorine compounds The principal use of hydrofluoric acid is in organofluorine chemistry. Many organofluorine compounds are prepared using HF as the fluorine source, including Polytetrafluoroethylene, Teflon, fluoropolymers, fluorocarbons, and refrigeration, refrigerants such as freon. Many pharmaceuticals contain fluorine. Production of inorganic fluorides Most high-volume inorganic fluoride compounds are prepared from hydrofluoric acid. Foremost are Na3AlF6 ...
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Fluorite
Fluorite (also called fluorspar) is the mineral form of calcium fluoride, CaF2. It belongs to the halide minerals. It crystallizes in isometric cubic habit, although octahedral and more complex isometric forms are not uncommon. The Mohs scale of mineral hardness, based on scratch hardness comparison, defines value 4 as fluorite. Pure fluorite is colourless and transparent, both in visible and ultraviolet light, but impurities usually make it a colorful mineral and the stone has ornamental and lapidary uses. Industrially, fluorite is used as a flux for smelting, and in the production of certain glasses and enamels. The purest grades of fluorite are a source of fluoride for hydrofluoric acid manufacture, which is the intermediate source of most fluorine-containing fine chemicals. Optically clear transparent fluorite lenses have low dispersion, so lenses made from it exhibit less chromatic aberration, making them valuable in microscopes and telescopes. Fluorite optics are also ...
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Natrona, Pennsylvania
Natrona is an unincorporated community in Harrison Township, Allegheny County in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania. It is located in western Pennsylvania within the Pittsburgh Metropolitan Statistical Area, approximately northeast of Downtown Pittsburgh. Natrona is situated along the Allegheny River at Lock and Dam Four, Pools Three and Four between Brackenridge, Natrona Heights, Karns, Allegheny Township, and Lower Burrell. History The original village of Natrona – then known as East Tarentum – was built as a company town by the Pennsylvania Salt Manufacturing Company in the 1850s. The company began with two salt wells in 1850, and continued operations until 1959. By 1876, the company, which owned the cryolite deposits of Greenland, brought the crude mineral to its works in Natrona, where the mineral was pulverized, sifted, heated, reacted with calcium carbonate and leached to produce pure carbonate of soda (sodium carbonate) and aluminate of soda (sodium alumina ...
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Bauxite
Bauxite is a sedimentary rock with a relatively high aluminium content. It is the world's main source of aluminium and gallium. Bauxite consists mostly of the aluminium minerals gibbsite (Al(OH)3), boehmite (γ-AlO(OH)) and diaspore (α-AlO(OH)), mixed with the two iron oxides goethite (FeO(OH)) and haematite (Fe2O3), the aluminium clay mineral kaolinite (Al2Si2O5(OH)4) and small amounts of anatase (TiO2) and ilmenite (FeTiO3 or FeO.TiO2). Bauxite appears dull in luster and is reddish-brown, white, or tan. In 1821, the French geologist Pierre Berthier discovered bauxite near the village of Les Baux in Provence, southern France. Formation Numerous classification schemes have been proposed for bauxite but, , there was no consensus. Vadász (1951) distinguished lateritic bauxites (silicate bauxites) from karst bauxite ores (carbonate bauxites): * The carbonate bauxites occur predominantly in Europe, Guyana, Suriname, and Jamaica above carbonate rocks (limestone and do ...
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Mineral
In geology and mineralogy, a mineral or mineral species is, broadly speaking, a solid chemical compound with a fairly well-defined chemical composition and a specific crystal structure that occurs naturally in pure form.John P. Rafferty, ed. (2011): Minerals'; p. 1. In the series ''Geology: Landforms, Minerals, and Rocks''. Rosen Publishing Group. The geological definition of mineral normally excludes compounds that occur only in living organisms. However, some minerals are often biogenic (such as calcite) or are organic compounds in the sense of chemistry (such as mellite). Moreover, living organisms often synthesize inorganic minerals (such as hydroxylapatite) that also occur in rocks. The concept of mineral is distinct from rock, which is any bulk solid geologic material that is relatively homogeneous at a large enough scale. A rock may consist of one type of mineral, or may be an aggregate of two or more different types of minerals, spacially segregated into distinct ...
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