Chem Week 2: Vanadium

Vanadium was 'discovered' in 1801 by Andres Manuel del Rio who originally named it erythronium. His contemporaries convinced him however that it was identical to chromium. It was 'rediscovered' 30 years later by Nils Gabriel Sefstrom who named it vanadium after the Norse goddess of beauty and fertility (Vanadis aka. Freya).

Its symbol is V and its atomic number is 23. It is a soft, silvery grey ductile transition metal. It is protected from oxidation by a  formation of an oxide layer. 

What's a transition metal? From wikipeida:

The term transition metal (sometimes also called a transition element) has two possible meanings:

• In the past it referred to any element in the d-block of the periodic table, which includes groups 3 to 12 on the periodic table. All elements in the d-block are metals.

• The modern, IUPAC definition^[1] states that a transition metal is "an element whose atom has an incomplete d sub-shell, or which can give rise to cations with an incomplete d sub-shell."

Vanadium occurs naturally in 65 minerals and fossil fuel deposits and is used to produce specialty steel alloys. These may be used in manufacturing high speed steel tools. This element may also be found in living organisms where it may be used as an active center for enzymes.

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