Gold element silver (as electrum) and also naturally alloyed with copper and palladium. Less commonly, it occurs in minerals as gold compounds, often with tellurium (gold tellurides). Gold is resistant to most acids, though it does dissolve in aqua regia, a mixture of nitric acid and hydrochloric acid, which forms a soluble tetrachloroaurate anion. Gold is insoluble in nitric acid, which dissolves silver and base metals, a property that has long been used to refine gold and to confirm the presence of gold in metallic objects, giving rise to the term "acid test". Gold also dissolves in alkaline solutions of cyanide,
Acid-base extraction of an acid to a mixture of an organic base and acid will result in the acid remaining uncharged, while the base will be protonated to form a salt. If the organic acid, such as a carboxylic acid, is sufficiently strong, its self-ionization can be suppressed by the added acid. Conversely, the addition of a base to a mixture of an organic acid and base will result in the base remaining uncharged, while the acid is deprotonated to give the corresponding salt. Once again, the self-ionization of a strong base is suppressed by the added base. The acid-base extraction procedure