Nitrogen

iso	NA	half-life	DT	DE (MeV)	DP
¹³N	syn	9.964 min	ε	2.220	¹³C
¹⁴N	99.634%	¹⁴N is stable with 7 neutrons.
¹⁵N	0.366%	¹⁵N is stable with 8 neutrons.

All properties are for STP unless otherwise stated.

Nitrogen (N) is the most common element in the Earth's atmosphere, making up over 70% of the gases present. Essential for living organisms, Nitrogen plays a large part in living tissues and the amino acids that make them up. Nitrogen has a wide variety of uses in addition, such as restoring the soil so that farmers can grow crops. Nitrogen's inert properties make it useful in scientific experiments in that it prevents oxygen from reacting with anything else. [1] Known as an element since 1772, it was well used in compounds even earlier.

History

A man named Daniel Rutherford discovered nitrogen in the northern country of Scotland in 1772. It was then thought to be a noxious air, but it was later discovered that it was simply an inert gas through various experiments. [2] Nitrogen compounds were known as early as the Middle Ages (or more commonly known as the medieval ages), and were used such as to dissolve gold. The acid was made known as aqua regia, or King's Water, and was praised for that ability.[3]

Carl Wilhelm Scheele, Henry Cavendish, and Joseph Priestley were also studying Nitrogen around the time that Daniel Rutherford did, and it was referred to as 'burnt air' among them. However, later it was considered 'lifeless' by Antoine Lavoisier who thought that its inert properties made it a dead gas.

Properties

Nitrogen is classified with the nonmetals on the right side of the periodic table of elements, which gives it a tendency to react readily with some elements on the left side of the table such as lithium and magnesium to form nitrides. [4] It is found naturally in the state of a gas in the atmosphere, or trapped in rock layers. The gas is colorless, odorless, and is completely undetectable to the basic human senses. The atoms are mostly found in pairs as a diatomic Nitrogen molecule, making it trivalent in most bonds. [5] Nitrogen is not flammable, and so is not useful in any environment that requires heat transfer. [6] Nitrogen's electronegativity is 3.0, and has five electrons in the outer shell. Nitrogen commonly bonds with itself in the atmosphere.

Nitrogen freezes at 63K, and condenses into a liquid at 77K. Liquid nitrogen resembles water, and is used as a common cyrogen, or temperature engineering. [7]

Occurrences

Nitrogen Cycle

Main Article: Nitrogen cycle

Nitrogen occurs in nature as a diatomic molecule, bonding in pairs with itself in the atmosphere. It makes up over 75% of the gases making up the atmosphere.[8] It is also involved in the formation of stars and is throughout space. Nitrogen itself is created by stars deep in space, including our own Sun. The element of nitrogen is also a major component in Titan's, Jupiter's moon, atmosphere. Nitrogen is also found in all living organisms as an essential part of life. Legumes are responsible for a large part of Nitrogen regeneration, and so are a popular crop for farmers to fertilize soil. [9]

Uses

Liquid Nitrogen

The element Nitrogen has many uses for both natural and artificial needs. Nitrogen is essential for growing crops and is invaluable to farmers, who rely on it for their very livelihood. Plant crops such as the legume family restore Nitrogen to the soil, making it fertile for use to grow other crops again, and so farmers rotate their crops. Nitrogen is also an inert gas, meaning it doesn't react to make chemical bonds, and so it is a very useful tool for chemists and scientists to use as a shield to keep oxygen from reacting with other reactive elements. [10] Nitrogen is valued for its cooling properties, and is often used in food freezers. It is also used to fill light bulbs since it is so unreactive. These qualities allow it to be used in a variety of situations. [11] An important nitrogen compound is amino acids. Without these acids, life would cease to exist as known. Nitrogen makes up a huge part of these acids, making it essential. Also, the key element in dynamite is nitroglycerin, another nitrogen compound. [12]

Nitrogen is used inside light bulbs.

Isotopes

Main Article: Isotopes

Isotopes of Nitrogen are commonly found in the stable forms of ¹⁴N and ¹⁵N. Nitrogen-14 is by far the most common, making up 99% of the isotope population. However, ¹³N is made artificially and has a half-life of nine minutes. Other isotopes of nitrogen have half-lives of seconds, and are not noteable. [13]

References

Nitrogen Wikipedia
Interesting Facts Universal Industrial Gases
Chemical Properties Lenntech
History History of Nitrogen
Important Compounds and Information Pafko

Nitrogen

From CreationWiki, the encyclopedia of creation science

Contents

History

Properties

Occurrences

Uses

Isotopes

References

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