Personas Elementum

by K.C. Kim

From a human viewpoint, elements are not born equal. Some elements enjoy affectionate attention throughout human history, some are cast as villains with bad reputations, and a majority of the others are destined to live forever in the blue-color working class of the elemental hierarchy. Take the example of copper. The advancement of the early tool-making human society was much aided by copper so that this particular epoch was called the "Bronze Age" after copper combined with its minor partner, tin. Gold, among several celebrated aristocratic elements, has been used for adornment as a precious and decorative element, and it appears that gold will not lose its luster for the foreseeable future. Then there is the element lead, which followed the rise and fall of the Roman Empire. This element even stirred up the modern day public's anti-element sentiment as in "no-lead" gasoline. Silicon is, of course, a modern-day "hero" element. In its embodiment in the form of microchips, it already controls our daily lives in every imaginable way. The anecdotal stories go on and on. It would take many book volumes to tell a significant part of every elemental story.

Take another example, that of iron. Can you imagine a world without iron? Not only renowned for its muscular forms of every shape, this forget-me-not element will also make you feel good and energetic if you do not ignore it in your diet. On the other hand, there are many working-class elements that are doomed to remain forever in the ordinary, humdrum status like the lackluster carbon (when it's not in the form of a diamond!). All living forms, miraculous as they are, represent extraordinary arrangements of several ordinary elements such as carbon, nitrogen, oxygen, etc. Once in a while, an element rises to a meteoric status because of its role in some extraordinary discoveries. Look at the case of iridium. With their fascination for dinosaurs, Luis Alvarez and other prominent scientists found out that iridium is the "smoking gun" for all dinosaur extinction, only claiming its notoriety some 65 million years later!

Then there is the mother of all elements: hydrogen. She is most unassuming and yet perhaps the most abundant in the universe. All other elements, therefore, all things, living and dead, derived their existence from hydrogen. To this day most living things on Earth, for example, owe their existence to the sun's hydrogen energy. We should be praising hydrogen. Hydrogen's glory days may yet be coming.

The trend of elemental discovery is, of course, toward heavy elements-elements with shorter lifetimes than their lighter brethren. A relatively more recent element that is building its reputation is plutonium. Scientists claim that plutonium is man-made, elevating man's status to that of Creator. Regardless of the claim, this element from its infancy caused such havoc that on several occasions it threatened to destroy all living things on the earth thereby claiming its dominance over the entire elemental family.

Pioneering scientists gave the name "actinide" to a family of heavy elements that includes plutonium. Almost simultaneously, human beings entered the "Nuclear Age." It is interesting to note that the first phase of the Nuclear Age began with the development of weapons using these elements just as the "Bronze Age" may have begun with weapons or hunting tools. The similarities are striking. The element plutonium was named after the farthest sun-orbiting planet Pluto by its discoverer Glenn Seaborg. Immediately after its introduction the "hyperactive" plutonium tried to assert its superiority by launching actions designed to ensure its dominance over all things, dead or alive. It declared war against all other elements.

Scientists in general like to find out the real personality of an element. For well over 50 years now, a countless number of smart people have probed plutonium to discover its inner workings as well as its relationships with its other elemental brethren. Once in a while during the course of an elemental adolescent period, we have in hand a real temper tantrum to deal with. This seems to be the case with plutonium. Presently we seem to be groping for ways of taming plutonium for peaceful elemental coexistence. No doubt, history will note how well we succeeded.

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