The History of Chemistry

21: The Periodic Prophet

Steve Cohen Episode 21

Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.

0:00 | 25:32

We learn about the development of spectroscopy by Bunsen and Kirchhoff, and its ramifications, like remote sensing of materials--including heavenly bodies. We also learn about new elements discovered by spectroscopy, which boosted Mendeleev's periodic table and earned him accolades. Mendeleev, however, also predicted elements that don't exist, and failed to anticipate an entire classification of elements found in the 1890s by William Ramsey. Writer H.G. Wells even included one of these elements in a world-famous sci-fi novel.

Support the show