The periodic table jumped into the street and will be there all year | Chemistry

It is official: commemorations of the 150th anniversary of the periodic table of chemical elements began. The table of the International Year of Periodicals – declared by the United Nations – was launched this Tuesday in Paris by UNESCO and the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry

In 1869, the Russian chemist Dmitri Mendeleev contributed to a scientific revolution. by proposing an organization for known chemical elements up to now. Mendeleev prepared a communication in Russian on this systematic clbadification of chemical elements, which will be presented on March 6, 1869 to the Russian Society of Chemistry and later, again in 1869, in a brief note in

In Portugal, several initiatives will be taken to commemorate the periodic table of Mendeleev during the year. Under the responsibility of the Portuguese Society of Chemistry, these celebrations also began on Tuesday with the formation of periodic human tables in 12 cities in Portugal and Madeira.

Among the most important creations of the history of science

Among other students, staff members, researchers and professors of the Instituto Superior Técnico (IST) of Lisbon, Filipe Rosa was holding a sign with the symbol of a chemical element: cesium. The chemistry student would have preferred to stay with gallium, but he was not unhappy with the chemical element that he had to embody on the human periodic table. After all, Filipe Rosa, 19, loves liquid metals at room temperature, like cesium and gallium. "I find a joke about liquid metals because a person looks at a metal and thinks it's not bending in. But liquid metals are very interesting," he says when he hears the whistle and orders from Henrique Matos, one of the vice presidents of the Department of Chemical Engineering.

Dressed in a t-shirt with a periodic table showing the shortage. and the abundance of chemical elements, 120 participants – 118 for chemical elements and two representing lanthanides and actinides – gave life to the periodic table from Alameda to IST. "Check if the poster is correct!" When they whistled, they saw [da Alameda] for the construction of the department of [Engenharia] chemistry, "warned Henrique Matos. At the time of shooting, photographs of the tower of the building had been taken and a drone captured the moment.

The physicist Luís Oliveira e Silva figured in this periodic table of waves and laughter. "It is essential," said the physicist smiling on the periodic table. "Many advances in quantum mechanics are motivated by studies of atomic structures such as hydrogen," he said. The chairman of the scientific council IST was even ready to hold the einsteinium plate (named after Albert Einstein), but eventually kept the lithium. "It has been said here that lithium has both positive and negative aspects: it is a fundamental element for the construction of batteries, but it is also used in medical chemistry for the treatment of depression. "

Note that this periodic table was developed by Jorge Calado, chemist and professor emeritus at IST. Looking at the different plates with the chemical elements, we remembered curiosities about certain elements. "There is the radio discovered by Mrs. Curie," he said.

For the chemist, the periodic table is one of the most important creations of the history of science. "It's as important as Newton's gravitation or Darwin's theory of evolution," he said. About Dmitri Mendeleev, he sees him as a visionary: "He was the first to do something that encompbaded virtually all known elements."

At this human table was also Teresa Duarte, president of the Department of Chemical Engineering and one of the organizers of the commemorations of the International Year of the Periodic Table at IST. "I think people do not realize every day that the periodic table is the basis of everything," he said, indicating that all year there would be more activities to show, like the painting. of the Night of the Periodical. (March 6), where the bingo will be played with the periodic table; lectures on the subject, including one with Jorge Calado (February 19 at noon); and the travel of the periodic table to primary schools in the ninth grade.

For now, in the periodic table of Tuesday, Teresa Duarte has embodied the gallium that Filipe Rosa had desired so much. "If I had known, we could have traded," joked Teresa Duarte. But in the end, the student says that he did not care: "I did not expect it, but it was funny and even the teachers were in the middle." Now he wanted to follow the rest of the activities throughout the year.

different, same language

In Braga, the rain dictated a change of project. The center of the city, rich in Baroque and neoclbadical buildings built in silicon and aluminum that make up granite, gave birth to cement – rich in elements such as silicon and calcium – and wood – like the carbon of the University of Minho. Without the expected audience, the 118 students from two high schools in the municipality – Alberto Sampaio and Sá de Miranda – were arranged in the format of the periodic table and erected their slightly inclined chemical elements towards the ceiling in order to to be captured by

They all wore a t-shirt with a periodic table showing the elements with the most abundant reserves on the planet – hydrogen, carbon, nitrogen and oxygen, for example. – and those that are likely to become scarce over the next 100 years, such as silver and zinc. Margarida da Costa Rodrigues, a grade 12 student in Sá de Miranda, had to display the orange poster corresponding to zinc, a usual presence in metal alloys. For the PUBLIC, the student pointed out that it was important that the population "know a little about the periodic table of results", even to get an idea of ​​the uses of each chemical element in everyday life.

If zinc is part of human daily life, it is not the case for the other elements. Some of them only exist thanks to the experiments carried out in the laboratory. This is the case of all elements heavier than uranium, with nuclei ranging from 93 to 118 atoms and names created from relevant places and researchers in the history of science. One of them just honors the author of the periodic table.

Conscious that Mendelévio is a radioactive and artificial element, Diana Leite wanted to participate in the initiative to "show the relevance of the periodic table" and its taste for chemistry. "I am particularly curious about the properties of the elements, to know how they work," badumptioned the tenth grade student of Alberto Sampaio College. Already Gonçalo Gomes, an 11th year student of vocational training in Sá de Miranda, had mentioned Bohrio – an allusion to one of the first quantum physicists, the Danish Niels Bohr – and pointed out that the human periodic table was a contribution to the disclosure. Science.

One of the physics and chemistry professors who accompanied the initiative, Maria Rosa Sousa, congratulated the students for the l & # 39; membership and the speed with which they prepared the posters. "We only lost 45 minutes of clbad time doing the posters."

Despite the recognition of the losses "of impact and visibility" with the change of venue, the coordinator of the initiative at Braga, João Paulo André, argued that the main message The periodic table is perhaps the universal language of more immediate understanding. "The chemical elements are the same on Earth, in the nearest stars and in a very distant universe.As the words are all built with the alphabet, all the compounds with the elements are obtained," stressed the professor. of inorganic chemistry at the University of Minho.

"Chemistry will be in the street this year"

No Porto, even before 9 am, was expected to see them arrive at the statue of Almeida Garrett, next to the town hall. Nearly 1,200 students from 16 schools in the district came to celebrate the official opening day of the International Periodical Year. The Porto Chamber was badociated with the initiative and was welcomed on Tuesday with the Faculty of Science and the Faculty of Engineering of the University of Porto and the Institute of Engineering of Porto (ISEP) and the Portuguese Society of Chemistry researchers, students, teachers and curious

Upon arrival, students receive a t-shirt, a diploma of participation and a raincoat whose color depends on the block they represent. Blue represents the block s, the orange block p. Red corresponds to block d and green to block f of this periodic table.

Among the many "o stora" and "do I really have to wear this?" They are equipped. While waiting to constitute the human periodic table, the students went to live in small or large groups. Matilde Ferreira, of the Internship College of Oaks, was accompanied by 55 colleagues from Grades 11 and 12. He admits that he does not know which block he stands in because he "did not pay much attention," but says that "he could do anything about it." A chemical element, it would be gold because it was shining "or oxygen" because without it, it would not be there ".

to form the painting which even had drones to mix, hear The song of the periodic table created by the Youtube channel AsapSCIENCE (Canadian) and which won a version updated last year. Each plate of each chemical element is held by two students. Students are coordinated by the voices and palms of the organizers who tell them when to raise and lower them, while colleagues who have not been able to participate have applauded on the sides.