Lead

Lead is a heavy metal that is denser than most common materials. It is soft and malleable, and also has a relatively low melting point. In 2014, the annual global production of lead was about ten million tonnes. Lead is a neurotoxin that accumulates in soft tissues and bones.

About Lead in brief

Summary Lead Lead is a heavy metal that is denser than most common materials. It is soft and malleable, and also has a relatively low melting point. When freshly cut, lead is silvery with a hint of blue; it tarnishes to a dull gray color when exposed to air. In 2014, the annual global production of lead was about ten million tonnes, over half of which was from recycling. Lead is a neurotoxin that accumulates in soft tissues and bones. It damages the nervous system and interferes with the function of biological enzymes, causing neurological disorders, such as brain damage and behavioral problems. In the late 19th century, lead’s toxicity was recognized, and its use has since been phased out of many applications. However, many countries still allow the sale of products that expose humans to lead, including some types of paints and bullets. Lead has the highest atomic number of any stable element and three of its isotopes are endpoints of major nuclear decay chains of heavier elements. Lead’s close-packed face-centered cubic structure and high atomic weight result in a high atomic number in a divalent metals structure like divalent calcium and strontium. Pure lead has a bright, silvery appearance. It takes on a dull, tarnish on contact with moist air and takes on the hue of which depends on the prevailing conditions. This is the rare origin of the idiom of the rarest lead, which goes over a balloon like a balloon to go over the top of a skyscraper, and is the reason it is so difficult to make into a lead-based product.

Lead can form chains and polyhedral structures, and can be easily extracted from its ores; prehistoric people in Western Asia knew of it. Galena is a principal ore of lead which often bears silver, Interest in silver helped initiate widespread extraction and use of lead in ancient Rome. The sum of the first four ionization energies of lead exceeds that of tin, contrary to what periodic trends would predict. In lead, the inert pair effect increases the separation between its s- and p-orbitals, and the gap cannot be overcome by the energy that would be released by extra bonds following hybridization. Rather than having a diamond cubic structure, lead forms metallic bonds in which only the prons are delocalized and shared between the Pb2+ ions. Lead consequently has a similar structure to that of calcium and divalentium. It has a high density of 11cm3, which is greater than that of common metals such as iron, copper and zinc. This density is the same as that of iron and copper that is common in common metals like iron, zinc and copper. It can be used in construction, plumbing, batteries, bullets and shot, weights, solders, pewters, fusible alloys, white paints, leaded gasoline, and radiation shielding. Lead and lead oxides react with acids and bases, and it tends to form covalent bonds. Its weak metallic character is illustrated by its amphoteric nature.