Americium: Difference between revisions

Americium is one of the most used and most recognizable elements in the radio-active category for the average person other than the element it's created from which is the element Plutonium. Americium is also the element seen in hopefully every home in the United States. In the use of Americium it is a part of a smoke detector that helps in being able to detect the fires. Americium is also the most commercialized and publicly used item in the radioactive section of the elemental table.

Americium looks like a slivery white synthetic metal. When Americium is left out, it begins to tarnish in the dry air, and is resistant to alkalis. Americium is seen to be more dense than lead had its own distinct color to it. Americium possibly can be found on earth although only in fragmental amounts that could have been made in the past when there was huge groups of uranium when and then nuclear reactions could take place. Americium-243 is made from the release of isotopes from Plutonium-239 in the nuclear reactions. <ref>Americium Properties[http://www.lenntech.com/periodic/elements/am.htm Physical properties on Americium]. ''Lenntech''. Web. November 3 2011.</ref> Americium has a lot of chemical properties and is in a lot of mainstream products, so it has been used a lot, and has been seen as a staple in a lot of processes such as energy from nuclear reactors, as well in  our households as fire alarms.