Who invented hydrogen

The simplest isotope, called protium, is just ordinary hydrogen. The second, a stable isotope called deuterium , was discovered in The third isotope, tritium , was discovered in Estimated Crustal Abundance : 1. Estimated Oceanic Abundance : 1. Number of Stable Isotopes : 2 View all isotope data. Electron Shell Configuration :. Electricity would grow crops. Electricity would provide entertainment. Electricity would win wars. It seemed almost impossible to talk about electricity at all without invoking the future it would deliver.

All this brings us neatly back to the new past for Grove and the gas battery that our future technologies may deliver. If the future of new and clean electrical technology — that contemporary promoters of the fuel cell are today offering us — really happens, then the obscure story about a curious little invention by a largely forgotten Welsh man of science will become an epic piece of technological history.

That future, if it happens, will change our past. It will change the ways we understand the history of Victorian technology and the ways in which the Victorians used those technologies to tell stories about their future selves. We should not forget that we still pattern our own projected futures in the same way as they did.

We extrapolate bits of our contemporary technologies into the future in the same sort of way. It is interesting to speculate in that case why particular sorts of technologies make for good futures and others apparently do not.

At the end of the 19th century the gas battery clearly did not look like a good piece of future making technology to many people. It does now. This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article. Already a subscriber? Sign in. Thanks for reading Scientific American. One current use is in atomic clocks, though rubidium is considered less accurate than caesium.

The rubidium version of the atomic clock employs the transition between two hyperfine energy states of the rubidium isotope. These clocks use microwave radiation which is tuned until it matches the hyperfine transition, at which point the interval between wave crests of the radiation can be used to calibrate time itself. Until then I'm Meera Senthilingam, thanks for listening and goodbye. Chemistry in its element is brought to you by the Royal Society of Chemistry and produced by thenakedscientists.

There's more information and other episodes of Chemistry in its element on our website at chemistryworld. Click here to view videos about Hydrogen. View videos about. Help Text. Learn Chemistry : Your single route to hundreds of free-to-access chemistry teaching resources. We hope that you enjoy your visit to this Site. We welcome your feedback.

Data W. Haynes, ed. Version 1. Coursey, D. Schwab, J. Tsai, and R. Dragoset, Atomic Weights and Isotopic Compositions version 4. Periodic Table of Videos , accessed December Podcasts Produced by The Naked Scientists. Download our free Periodic Table app for mobile phones and tablets. Explore all elements. D Dysprosium Dubnium Darmstadtium. E Europium Erbium Einsteinium.

F Fluorine Francium Fermium Flerovium. G Gallium Germanium Gadolinium Gold. I Iron Indium Iodine Iridium. K Krypton. O Oxygen Osmium Oganesson. U Uranium. V Vanadium. X Xenon. Y Yttrium Ytterbium. Z Zinc Zirconium. Membership Become a member Connect with others Supporting individuals Supporting organisations Manage my membership.

Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Youtube. Discovery date. Discovered by. Henry Cavendish. Origin of the name. The name is derived from the Greek 'hydro' and 'genes' meaning water forming. Melting point. Boiling point. Atomic number. Relative atomic mass. Key isotopes. Electron configuration.

CAS number. ChemSpider ID. ChemSpider is a free chemical structure database. Electronegativity Pauling scale. Covalent bond. Found in. SiH 4. AsH 3. Common oxidation states.

Atomic mass. Half life. Mode of decay. Relative supply risk. Crustal abundance ppm. Top 3 producers. Top 3 reserve holders.

Political stability of top producer. Political stability of top reserve holder. Researchers have been studying hydrogen with great interest for years because of its potential as a pollution-free fuel. However, there is a major problem with hydrogen fuel: it is more expensive than gas. In general, costs associated with hydrogen fuel technology are "a very challenging barrier because, as of now, people would prefer to have better technologies at the ongoing price," Chahine told Live Science.

Another issue with hydrogen fuel is that the process of hydrogen production itself is in fact not so "clean" or pollution free. Researchers have therefore been looking for alternative and more environmentally friendly ways of producing hydrogen that would ideally eliminate CO 2 emissions from the process.

Last year, for instance, scientists at the U. The current version of the generator is really small, but if it turns out it can be expanded, it could allow scientists to produce enough hydrogen to provide fuel for cars and generators.

Another way of producing hydrogen, called "biological water splitting," would involve the use of certain photosynthetic microbes that use light energy to produce hydrogen from water as part of their metabolic processes, according to the National Renewable Energy Laboratory , where researchers are currently investigating this process.