Ytterbium

Notable characteristics

Ytterbium is a soft, malleable and rather oxidizes in air.

Ytterbium has three crystal structure while the high-temperature gamma form has a body-centered crystal structure.

Normally, the beta form has a resistivity is tenfold larger at about 39,000 atm (3.9 GPa) but then drops dramatically, to around 10% of its room temperature resistivity value, at 40,000 atm (4 GPa).

Ytterbium is one of the lanthanides that is able to become divalent. Like the other potentially divalent lanthanides, samarium and europium, it is capable of being extracted into mercury by the use of sodium amalgam, which made it one of the easier lanthanides to purify using classical techniques. However, this divalency was not discovered until the 20th century.

Applications

Usually, very small anount of Yb is used; either small sample of radioactive isotope as source of X-rays, or small concentration dopant.

Source of X-rays

The ¹⁶⁹Yb radiography of small objects.

Doping of stainless steel

Ytterbium could also be used to help improve the grain refinement, strength, and other mechanical properties of alloys have been used in dentistry.

Yb as dopant of active media

Yb is used as dopant in optics materials, usially in the form of atomic percent. Glasses (optical fibers), crystals and ceramics with Yb³⁺ are used.

Ytterbium is often used as a solid state lasers. Yb lasers commonly radiate in the 1.06-1.12µm band being optically pumped at wavelength 900nm - 1µm, dependently on the ghost and application. Small power scaling.

The kinetic of excitations in Yb-doped materials is simple and can be described within concept of effective cross-sections; for the most of Yb-doped laser materials, the McCumber relation holds ^[1], although the application to the Yb-doped composite materials was under discussion ^[2][3].

Usually, low concentrtations of Yb are used. At high concentration of excitaitons, the Yb-doped materials show photodarkening ^[4] (glass fibers) or ever switch to the broadband emission ^[5] (crystals and ceramics) instead of the efficient laser action.

Solar cells

Ytterbium has a single nanometers, which is used to convert infrared energy into electricity in solar cells.

History

Ytterbium was Jean Charles Galissard de Marignac in 1878. Marignac found a new component in the earth then known as erbia and named it ytterbia (after Ytterby, the Swedish town where he found the new erbia component). He suspected that ytterbia was a compound of a new element he called ytterbium.

In 1907, the French chemist Georges Urbain separated Marignac's ytterbia into two components, neoytterbia and lutecia. Neoytterbia would later become known as the element ytterbium and lutecia would later be known as the element Auer von Welsbach independently isolated these elements from ytterbia at about the same time but called them aldebaranium and cassiopeium.

The chemical and physical properties of ytterbium could not be determined until 1953 when the first nearly pure ytterbium was produced.

Occurrence

Ytterbium is found with other compounds of ytterbium are rare—they haven't been well characterized yet.

Isotopes

Main article: Isotopes of ytterbium

Naturally occurring ytterbium is composed of 7 stable radioactive isotopes have half-lifes that are less than 2 hours, and the majority of these have half lifes that are less than 20 minutes. This element also has 12 meta states, with the most stable being Yb-169m (t_½ 46 seconds).

The isotopes of ytterbium range in optical lattices.

Precautions

Although ytterbium is fairly stable, it nevertheless should be stored in closed containers to protect it from air and moisture. All compounds of ytterbium should be treated as highly toxic although initial studies appear to indicate that the danger is limited. Ytterbium compounds are, however, known to cause skin and eye irritation and may be teratogenic. Metallic ytterbium dust poses a fire and explosion hazard.

Compounds

• YCl₃, YF₃
• Oxides: Y₂O₃

See also:

See also

• Erbium
• Terbium
• Yttrium

References

1. ^ reference about [[McCumber relation]
2. ^ D. Kouznetsov (2007). "Comment on Efficient diode-pumped Yb:Gd₂SiO₅ laser , Appl. Phys. Lett. 88, 221117 (2006)". Applied Physics Letters 90.
3. ^ Guangjun Zhao; Liangbi Su, Jun Xu, Heping Zeng (2007). "Response to Comment on Efficient diode-pumped Yb:Gd₂SiO₅ laser, Appl. Phys. Lett. 90, 066101 (2007),". Applied Physics Letters 90: 066103.
4. ^ Joona J. Koponen; Mikko J. Söderlund, Hanna J. Hoffman, and Simo K. T. Tammela. "Measuring photodarkening from single-mode ytterbium doped silica fibers". Optics Express 14 (24): 11539-11544.
5. ^ J.-F. Bisson; D.Kouznetsov, K.Ueda, S.T. Fredrich-Thornton, K.Petermann, G.Huber (2007). "Switching of emissivity and photoconductivity in highly doped Yb³⁺:Y₂O₃ and Lu₂O₃ ceramics". Applied Physics Letters 90: 201901 (3 pages).

Also:

• Los Alamos National Laboratory – Ytterbium
• Guide to the Elements – Revised Edition, Albert Stwertka, (Oxford University Press; 1998) ISBN 0-19-508083-1
• It's Elemental – Ytterbium