G for Gallium

This is the seventh in the series of 26 posts this month, one post a day, barring four Sundays, each on a theme corresponding to a letter of the English alphabet. My theme this year is "Chemicals in our life", spurred by my interest in chemistry.

We might not get to hear much about this element, but it's there everywhere, sort of, in this age of electronics and the internet.

We will come to that soon.

Before that, a little bit about Gallium, the element itself. 

It has the atomic number 31 and was discovered in 1875 by French chemist Paul-Émile Lecoq de Boisbaudran, who named it after Gallia, the Latin name for France.

Gallium has a silvery-blue appearance and is soft enough to be cut with a knife. 

It has a very low melting point of about 29.8 degrees C (85.6 degrees F), which means it can melt in your hand or on a hot day.

It is one of the few metals that can exist as a liquid at room temperature. 

Its boiling point is 2,204 degrees C (3,999.2 degrees F)

Gallium has many uses in various fields, especially in electronics and optics. 

About 95% of all gallium is used to make gallium arsenide (GaAs), which is used in blue-ray technology, blue and green LEDs, mobile phones, solar cells, lasers, and microwave devices.

Gallium is also used to make other compounds, such as gallium nitride (GaN), gallium phosphide (GaP), and gallium antimonide (GaSb), which have applications in optoelectronics, semiconductors, and thermoelectric devices. 

Gallium can also alloy with other metals, such as aluminium, copper, and zinc, to improve their properties.

Image from Pixabay

The information provided in this post has been obtained from multiple, authentic resources. However, it is presented in an abridged format and might not have all the details. Therefore, before acting on any information, readers are requested to exercise caution and do further research.

This post is a part of #BlogchatterA2Z 2023. I am also on A2Z April Challenge.