Metal aesthetics of metallic jewelry. Some metals have specialized uses; mercury is a liquid at room temperature and is used in switches to complete a circuit when it flows over the switch contacts. Radioactive metals such as uranium and plutonium are used in nuclear power plants to produce energy via nuclear fission. Shape memory alloys are used for applications such as pipes, fasteners and vascular stents. Metals can be doped with foreign molecules—organic, inorganic, biological and polymers. This doping entails the metal with new properties that are induced by the guest molecules. Applications in catalysis, medicine, electrochemical cells, corrosion and more
Metal halides it a liquid at room temperature. They are usually insoluble in water, but soluble in organic solvent. Polymeric metal halides generally have melting and boiling points that are higher than monomeric metal halides, but lower than ionic metal halides. They are soluble only in the presence of a ligand which liberates discrete units. For example, palladium chloride is quite insoluble in water, but it dissolves well in concentrated sodium chloride solution: Palladium chloride is insoluble in most organic solvents, but it forms soluble monomeric units with acetonitrile and benzonitrile: The tetrahedral tetrahalides of the first-row transition metals are prepared by