Amalgam (chemistry) with copper. A nitric acid solution of salts under investigation is applied to a piece of copper foil, and any mercury ions present will leave spots of silvery-coloured amalgam. Silver ions leave similar spots but are easily washed away, making this a means of distinguishing silver from mercury. The redox reaction involved where mercury oxidizes the copper is: Dental amalgam has been studied and is generally considered to be safe for humans, though the validity of some studies and their conclusions have been questioned. Amalgam (chemistry) An amalgam is an alloy of mercury with another metal, which may be a
Chemistry: A Volatile History and other elements, it was possible to create new compounds by design and industrial chemistry was born. Two decades after the world's first plastic – Bakelite – had been invented in 1907, Wallace Carothers successfully drew off a fibre from the interface of two liquids: hexane-1,6-diamine and decanedioyl-dichloride, which could be spun into a very fine, very strong thread. It was given the name nylon. Shockingly, only three weeks after the patent for nylon had been filed, a depressed Carothers slipped another carbon based compound into his own drink, potassium cyanide, and killed himself. Evidently, industrial chemistry wasn’t without its