Download E-books Periodic Tales: The Curious Lives of the Elements PDF

By Hugh Aldersey-Williams

Every little thing is made from them, from the furthest reaches of the universe to this booklet that you simply carry on your fingers, together with you. such as you, the weather have lives: personalities and attitudes, abilities and shortcomings, tales wealthy with that means. you might imagine of them because the inscrutable letters of the periodic desk yet you recognize them far better than you have an understanding of. Welcome to a stunning travel via heritage and literature, technological know-how and paintings. the following you will meet iron that rains from the heavens and noble gases that gentle tips on how to vice. you will learn the way lead can inform your destiny whereas zinc may well in the future line your coffin. you will find what connects the bones on your physique with the Whitehouse in Washington, the glow of a streetlamp with the salt in your dinner desk. From historic civilisations to modern tradition, from the oxygen of exposure to the phosphorus on your pee, the weather are close to and much and throughout us. Unlocking their remarkable secrets and techniques and vibrant pasts, "Periodic stories" will take you on a voyage of ask yourself and discovery, pleasure and novelty, good looks and fact. alongside the way in which, you can find that their tales are our tales, and their lives are inextricable from our personal.