Bromine Facts

Bromine! Ever heard of something called bromine? Iodine, yes, but what about bromine? Well, if you were a scientist or a person obsessed with chemistry and the elements, you probably would have heard of bromine and maybe even knew a thing or two about the element. However, if you don’t happen to be a scientist or a even a chemistry enthusiast, then the chances of knowing about the element is fairly low. Take the time to read this write-up to discover for yourself a few interesting and informative facts about bromine. Try not to stop at just reading about bromine. You can go ahead and make it a point to use the knowledge gained to break into a monologue when asked about bromine somewhere in the future. Who knows, maybe someday, facts on the element bromine may actually help you, more than you expect it to help you right now.

Interesting Facts About Bromine

Bromine is an element that was discovered by Antoine J. Balard in France way back in the 19^th century in the year 1826 to be precise.
Not many people know this, but bromine occurs naturally in seawater.
Bromine, by itself, is a heavy, volatile, reddish-brown and corrosive element. It is also noted for being a nonmetallic liquid element with a vapor and can be highly irritating.
As for the uses of bromine, there are quite a few. Bromine is used extensively in the production of gasoline antiknock mixtures, dyes, fumigants and photographic chemicals. Bromine, apart from being used for all of the above-mentioned purposes, is also used in the making of Brominated vegetable oil and certain medicines.
By now, you possibly know that bromine is a name derived from the Greek word ‘Bromos’, which means stench. However, did you know that bromine smells like he-goat and hence the name.
Bromine is a chemical element, no surprises there! In the periodic table, it is represented by a Br symbol. 35 makes for bromine’s atomic number, while 79.904 makes for its atomic mass.
Bromine, as an element, falls under the halogen element group.
[Ar]4s23d104p5! No, this is not a random listing down of numbers and alphabets. It, in fact, is the ‘Electronic Configuration’ of bromine.
When expressed in °Kelvin, bromine melts at 265.9. When expressed in the same scale, bromine boils at 331.9. Now that you know the melting and boiling point of bromine, it might help you to know a little about the density of the element. Bromine comes with a density (g/cc) of 3.12.
For commercial purposes, bromine is extracted from brine pools that are found in the United States of America and Israel, making it hardly surprising that these two countries specialize in the production of Bromine. Apart from the United States of America and Israel, China too enjoys an abundance of brine pools, making it a very important country as far as the production of bromine is concerned.
At high temperatures, organobromine compounds can be easily converted into free bromine atoms. This is a process, which is very effective in terminating free radical chemical chain reactions.

By now, you now are pretty much familiar with the element bromine and would really have quite a lot to say if someone were to ask you on the same.

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