Zirconium for use in jewelry. Zirconia is a component in some abrasives, such as grinding wheels and sandpaper. A small fraction of the zircon is converted to the metal, which finds various niche applications. Because of zirconium's excellent resistance to corrosion, it is often used as an alloying agent in materials that are exposed to aggressive environments, such as surgical appliances, light filaments, and watch cases. The high reactivity of zirconium with oxygen at high temperatures is exploited in some specialised applications such as explosive primers and as getters in vacuum tubes. The same property is (probably) the purpose of including
Zirconium nitride Zirconium nitride Zirconium nitride () is an inorganic compound used in a variety of ways due to its properties. ZrN grown by physical vapor deposition (PVD) is a light gold color similar to elemental gold. ZrN has a room-temperature electrical resistivity of 12.0 µΩ·cm, a temperature coefficient of resistivity of 5.6·10 Ω·cm/K, a superconducting transition temperature of 10.4 K, and a relaxed lattice parameter of 0.4575 nm. The hardness of single-crystal ZrN is 22.7±1.7 GPa and elastic modulus is 450 GPa. Zirconium nitride is a hard ceramic material similar to titanium nitride and is a cement-like refractory material. Thus it