Niobium

Niobium (pronounced /naɪˈoʊbiəm/ nye-OH-bee-əm) (Greek mythology: Niobe, daughter of Tantalus), or columbium (/kəˈlʌmbiəm/ kə-LUM-bee-əm), is the chemical element with the symbol Nb and the atomic number 41. A rare, soft, grey, ductile transition metal, niobium is found in the minerals pyrochlore, the main commercial source for niobium, and columbite. Niobium has physical and chemical properties similar to those of the element tantalum, and the t... more

Niobium (pronounced /naɪˈoʊbiəm/ nye-OH-bee-əm) (Greek mythology: Niobe, daughter of Tantalus), or columbium (/kəˈlʌmbiəm/ kə-LUM-bee-əm), is the chemical element with the symbol Nb and the atomic number 41. A rare, soft, grey, ductile transition metal, niobium is found in the minerals pyrochlore, the main commercial source for niobium, and columbite. Niobium has physical and chemical properties similar to those of the element tantalum, and the two are therefore difficult to distinguish. The English chemist Charles Hatchett reported a new element similar to tantalum in 1801, and named it columbium. In 1809, the English chemist William Hyde Wollaston wrongly concluded that tantalum and columbium were identical. The German chemist Heinrich Rose determined in 1846 that tantalum ores contain a second element, which he named niobium. In 1864 and 1865, a series of scientific findings clarified that niobium and columbium were the same element (as distinguished from tantalum), and for a... less