Scientists Discovers New Way To Make Platinum Compound
For centuries scientists and alchemists have tried everything under the sun to turn lead into gold. However, if technology had made any advancement and they had a laser on hand, they might have been able to make pseudo-platinum. Over half of the world’s Platinum goes into car catalytic converters, where it helps to neutralize the carbon monoxide and nitrous oxide in exhaust. Since auto-mobile manufacturers are still using Platinum for exhaust converters, the price has continued to go up.
However, in 2009 a Penn State chemist; Welford Castleman Jr used a laser to boot an electron off a molecule of tungsten carbine. The allowed the properties to change and act as is platinum would. Tungsten Carbide is a metallic compound that’s worth one thousandth less than the cost of platinum, which could someday bring down the price of platinum and step in as a replacement for auto-mobile manufacturers. Castleman hopes to repeat the trick with groups of tungsten carbide molecules, while also finding stand-ins for other rare elements. Like the alchemists, he still hasn’t figured out how to transmute lead to gold, but he’s happy to mimic the rest of the periodic table.
