Transition metal
Platinum is a chemical element; it has symbol Pt and atomic number 78. It is a dense, malleable, ductile, highly unreactive, precious, silverish-white transition metal. Its name originates from Spanish platina, a diminutive of plata "silver".
Platinum is a member of the platinum group of elements and group 10 of the periodic table of elements. It has six naturally occurring isotopes. It is one of the rarer elements in Earth's crust, with an average abundance of approximately 5 μg/kg. It occurs in some nickel and copper ores along with some native deposits. Because of its scarcity in Earth's crust, barely a few hundred metric tonnes are produced annually, and given its critical and important uses, it is highly valuable as well as a major precious metal commodity.
Platinum does not corrode, even at high temperatures, and is therefore considered a noble metal. Consequently, platinum is often found chemically uncombined as native platinum. Because it occurs naturally in the alluvial sands of various rivers, it was first used by pre-Columbian South American natives to produce artifacts. It was referenced in European writings as early as the 16th century, but it was not until Antonio de Ulloa published a report on a new metal of Colombian origin in 1748 that it began to be understood by scientists.
Platinum is a key component in catalytic converters, laboratory equipment, electrical contacts and electrodes, platinum resistance thermometers, dentistry equipment, and jewelry. …
Archaeologists have discovered traces of platinum in the gold used in ancient Egyptian burials. For example, a small box from burial of Shepenupet II was found to be decorated with gold-platinum hieroglyphs. However, the extent of early Egyptians' knowledge of the metal is unclear. It is possible they did not recognize there was platinum in their gold.
The metal was used by Native Americans near modern-day Esmeraldas, Ecuador to produce artifacts of a white gold-platinum alloy. Archeologists usually associate the tradition of platinum-working in South America with the La Tolita Culture (c. 600 BCE – 200 CE), but precise dates and location are difficult, as most platinum artifacts from the area were bought secondhand through the antiquities trade rather than obtained by direct archeological excavation. To work the metal, they would combine gold and platinum powders by sintering. The resulting gold–platinum alloy would then be soft enough to shape with tools. The platinum used in such objects was not the pure element, but rather a naturally occurring mixture of the platinum group metals, with small amounts of palladium, rhodium, and iridium.
The first European reference to platinum appears in 1557 in the writings of the Italian humanist Julius Caesar Scaliger as a description of an unknown noble metal found between Darién and Mexico, "which no fire nor any Spanish artifice has yet been able to liquefy". …
Platinum is a lustrous, ductile, and malleable, silver-white metal. Platinum is more ductile than gold, silver or copper, thus being the most ductile of pure metals.
Its physical characteristics and chemical stability make it useful for industrial applications. Its resistance to wear and tarnish is well suited to use in fine jewelry.
Platinum does not corrode, and bulk platinum does not oxidize in air at any temperature, but heated metal wires lose weight faster in air or oxygen than it does in a vacuum. The suggestion is that Pt forms a thin surface film of PtO2 that decomposes when heated above 500 °C.
The most common oxidation states of platinum are +2 and +4. The +1 and +3 oxidation states are less common, and are often stabilized by metal bonding in bimetallic (or polymetallic) species. Tetracoordinate platinum(II) compounds tend to adopt 16-electron square planar geometries. Although elemental platinum is generally unreactive, it is attacked by chlorine, bromine, iodine, and sulfur. It reacts vigorously with fluorine at 500 °C (932 °F) to form platinum tetrafluoride. Platinum is insoluble in hydrochloric and nitric acid, but dissolves in hot aqua regia (a mixture of nitric and hydrochloric acids), to form aqueous chloroplatinic acid, H2PtCl6:
Pt + 4 HNO3 + 6 HCl → H2PtCl6 + 4 NO2 + 4 H2O
As a soft acid, the Pt2+ ion has a great affinity for sulfide and sulfur ligands. Numerous DMSO complexes have been reported and care is taken in the choosing of reaction solvents. …
Platinum is an extremely rare metal on Earth, occurring at a concentration of only 0.005 ppm in Earth's crust. Platinum is often found chemically uncombined as native platinum and as alloy with the other platinum-group metals mostly. Most often native platinum is found in secondary deposits among alluvial deposits. The alluvial deposits used by pre-Columbian people in the Chocó Department, Colombia are still a source for platinum-group metals. Another large alluvial deposit is in the Ural Mountains, Russia, and it is still mined.
In nickel and copper deposits, platinum-group metals occur as sulfides (e.g., (Pt,Pd)S), tellurides (e.g., PtBiTe), antimonides (PdSb), and arsenides (e.g. PtAs2), and as end alloys with nickel or copper. Platinum arsenide, sperrylite (PtAs2), is a major source of platinum associated with nickel ores in the Sudbury Basin deposit in Ontario, Canada. At Platinum, Alaska, about 17,000 kg (550,000 ozt) was mined between 1927 and 1975. The mine ceased operations in 1990. The rare sulfide mineral cooperite, (Pt,Pd,Ni)S, contains platinum along with palladium and nickel. Cooperite occurs in the Merensky Reef within the Bushveld complex, Gauteng, South Africa.
In 1865, chromites were identified in the Bushveld region of South Africa, followed by the discovery of platinum in 1906. In 1924, the geologist Hans Merensky discovered a large supply of platinum in the Bushveld Igneous Complex in South Africa. …
Archaeologists have discovered traces of platinum in the gold used in ancient Egyptian burials. For example, a small box from burial of Shepenupet II was found to be decorated with gold-platinum hieroglyphs. However, the extent of early Egyptians' knowledge of the metal is unclear. It is possible they did not recognize there was platinum in their gold.
The metal was used by Native Americans near modern-day Esmeraldas, Ecuador to produce artifacts of a white gold-platinum alloy. Archeologists usually associate the tradition of platinum-working in South America with the La Tolita Culture (c. 600 BCE – 200 CE), but precise dates and location are difficult, as most platinum artifacts from the area were bought secondhand through the antiquities trade rather than obtained by direct archeological excavation. To work the metal, they would combine gold and platinum powders by sintering. The resulting gold–platinum alloy would then be soft enough to shape with tools. The platinum used in such objects was not the pure element, but rather a naturally occurring mixture of the platinum group metals, with small amounts of palladium, rhodium, and iridium.
Platinum has six naturally occurring isotopes: 190Pt, 192Pt, 194Pt, 195Pt, 196Pt, and 198Pt. The most abundant of these is 195Pt, comprising 33.83% of all platinum; it is the only stable isotope with a non-zero spin, of 1/2, and it is favorable for use in 195Pt NMR. Due to its spin and large abundance, 195Pt satellite peaks are also often observed in 1H and 31P NMR spectroscopy (e.g., for Pt-phosphine and Pt-alkyl complexes). The radioactive 190Pt is the least abundant of these at only 0.012%; it undergoes alpha decay with a half-life of 4.83×1011 years, causing the very low activity of 16.8 Bq/kg of natural platinum. The decay of this isotope has some use in isotope geology, though not directly for dating.
The other natural isotopes are theoretically capable of alpha decay also, but this has never been observed, and therefore they are considered stable. Platinum also has 38 synthetic isotopes ranging in atomic mass from 165 to 208, making the total number of known isotopes 44. The most stable of these radioisotopes is 193Pt, with a half-life of 50 years. Most platinum isotopes decay by some combination of beta decay and (on the proton-rich side) alpha decay. 188Pt, 191Pt, and 193Pt decay only by electron capture (besides the very small alpha branch of the first). 190Pt and 198Pt are predicted to have energetically favorable double beta decay paths.