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A white soft metallic element that tarnishes readily
Answer for the clue "A white soft metallic element that tarnishes readily ", 9 letters:
lanthanum
Alternative clues for the word lanthanum
Word definitions for lanthanum in dictionaries
Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
Word definitions in Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
metallic rare earth element, 1841, coined in Modern Latin by Swedish chemist and mineralogist Carl Gustav Mosander (1797-1858), who discovered it in 1839, from Greek lanthanein "to lie hidden, escape notice," from PIE root *ladh- "to be hidden" (see latent ...
Wikipedia
Word definitions in Wikipedia
Lanthanum is a soft , ductile , silvery-white metallic chemical element with symbol La and atomic number 57. It tarnishes rapidly when exposed to air and is soft enough to be cut with a knife. It is the eponym of the lanthanide series, a group of 15 similar ...
WordNet
Word definitions in WordNet
n. a white soft metallic element that tarnishes readily; occurs in rare earth minerals and is usually classified as a rare earth [syn: La , atomic number 57 ]
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Word definitions in The Collaborative International Dictionary
Lanthanum \Lan"tha*num\ (l[a^]n"th[.a]*n[u^]m), n. [NL., fr. Gr. lanqa`nein to lie hid, to be concealed.] (Chem.) A rare element of the rare earth group of the metals, of atomic number 57, allied to aluminum. It occurs in certain rare minerals, as cerite, ...
Wiktionary
Word definitions in Wiktionary
n. 1 (cx uncountable English) A metallic chemical element (''symbol'' La) with an atomic number of 57. 2 (cx countable English) An atom of this element.
Usage examples of lanthanum.
There is more cerium on Earth than copper, more neodymium and lanthanum than cobalt or nitrogen.
Through an accident of stellar evolution, lanthanum is almost unknown in the Reaches.
The load of lanthanum it carried was enough to serve a planet's needs for a century.
In January 1986, Alex Müller and Georg Bednorz, at the IBM Research Division in Zurich, Switzerland, produced superconductivity in a ceramic sample containing barium, copper, oxygen, and lanthanum (one of the rare-earth elements).
Chu and his fellow workers substituted yttrium, a metal with many rare-earth properties, for lanthanum in the ceramic pellets they were making.