Beryllium Element Facts

Beryllium Foils. Image courtesy Deglr6328; GNU.

Classification:	Beryllium is an alkali earth metal
Atomic weight:	9.01218 g/mol
Density @ 20 oC:	1.848 g/cm3
Atomic volume:	4.9 cm3/mol

Three varieties of beryl (left) and an emerald (right). Beryl and emerald's formula is Be₃Al₂(SiO₃)₆. The different colors are caused by traces of different elements. For example, emeralds are colored by traces of chromium ³⁺ (blue-green) or vanadium ³⁺ (yellow-green) ions. ⁽⁵⁾ Images from Reno Chris and Jan Arkesteijn.

The hexagonal crystal structure of BeO (beryllium oxide). Study of crystals of beryl and emerald provided a clue to the existence of the new element beryllium. Image from Solid State.

Discovery of Beryllium

In 1798, in France, René Haüy saw similarities in the crystal structures and properties of beryl and emerald. Beryl can appear in a number of different colors. Emerald is green. (See images on right.)

Haüy wondered if, despite their different colors, beryl and emerald could be made of the same elements. He approached Nicolas Louis Vauquelin, a chemist who specialized in analysis, and asked him to have a look. ⁽¹⁾

Vauquelin discovered a new, sweet-tasting substance in both emerald and beryl. We now call this substance beryllia, BeO. Despite its sweet taste, we now know that beryllium and its compounds are highly toxic.

(Although frowned upon today, old style chemists often tasted chemicals as part of their analyses. For some, the taste test put their careers into terminal decline. One such chemist was Karl Scheele, who discovered chlorine and oxygen. Scheele is believed to have died from poisoning caused by a variety of his experiments.)

Vauquelin proposed that beryllia contained a previously undiscovered element, an earth metal. He initially called this new element 'earth of beryl.' ⁽²⁾

The sweet taste of the salts then led to the new element being renamed 'glyceynum,' then 'glucina' or 'glucine.' The Greek 'glykis' means 'sweet' and is the source of our word 'glucose.' ^{(1), (3)}

Pure beryllium was first isolated from its salts in 1828 by Friederich Wöhler in Germany and, independently, Antoine Bussy in France. Both chemists reacted potassium with beryllium chloride in a platinum crucible yielding potassium chloride and beryllium.

Wöhler was unhappy with the name the new element had been given, preferring beryllium from the Greek word 'beryllos,' meaning the mineral beryl.

Wöhler's countryman, Martin Klaproth, had already pointed out in 1801 that yttria also forms sweet salts. A name derived from 'beryllos' would be less likely to cause confusion than one derived from 'glykis.' Klaproth also noted that a genus of plants was already called glucine. ⁽⁴⁾

Bussy, however, preferred to call the new element 'glucinium.'

Finally, in 1949, IUPAC chose beryllium as the element's name and this decision became official in 1957. ⁽²⁾

Beryllium played a large part in proving the existence of neutrons. In 1932 James Chadwick bombarded a sample of beryllium with alpha-rays (helium nuclei). He observed that the bombarded sample emitted a subatomic particle, which had mass but no charge. This neutral particle was the neutron.

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