Iodine by mass action due to the precipitation of the insoluble salt. Iodine is the least abundant of the stable halogens, comprising only 0.46 parts per million of Earth's crustal rocks (compare: fluorine 544 ppm, chlorine 126 ppm, bromine 2.5 ppm). Among the eighty-four elements which occur in significant quantities (elements 1–42, 44–60, 62–83, and 90–92), it ranks sixty-first in abundance. Iodide minerals are rare, and most deposits that are concentrated enough for economical extraction are iodate minerals instead. Examples include lautarite, Ca(IO), and dietzeite, 7Ca(IO)·8CaCrO. These are the minerals that occur as trace impurities in the caliche, found in Chile,
Fluorine is third-highest among all elements, behind helium and neon, which complicates the removal of electrons from neutral fluorine atoms. It also has a high electron affinity, second only to chlorine, and tends to capture an electron to become isoelectronic with the noble gas neon; it has the highest electronegativity of any element. Fluorine atoms have a small covalent radius of around 60 picometers, similar to those of its period neighbors oxygen and neon. The bond energy of difluorine is much lower than that of either or and similar to the easily cleaved peroxide bond; this, along with high electronegativity, accounts