Barium green color. Barium sulfate is used as an insoluble additive to oil well drilling fluid, as well as in a purer form, as X-ray radiocontrast agents for imaging the human gastrointestinal tract. The soluble barium ion and soluble compounds are poisonous, and have been used as rodenticides. Barium is a soft, silvery-white metal, with a slight golden shade when ultrapure. The silvery-white color of barium metal rapidly vanishes upon oxidation in air yielding a dark gray oxide layer. Barium has a medium specific weight and good electrical conductivity. Ultrapure barium is very difficult to prepare, and therefore many properties of
Barium hydroxide by two water ligands and six hydroxide ligands, which are respectively doubly and triply bridging to neighboring Ba sites. In the octahydrate, the individual Ba centers are again eight coordinate but do not share ligands. Industrially, barium hydroxide is used as the precursor to other barium compounds. The monohydrate is used to dehydrate and remove sulfate from various products. This application exploits the very low solubility of barium sulfate. This industrial application is also applied to laboratory uses. Barium hydroxide is used in analytical chemistry for the titration of weak acids, particularly organic acids. Its clear aqueous solution is guaranteed