Nickel
Nickel is a metallic
chemical element in the
periodic table that has the symbol
Ni and
atomic number 28.
Nickel is a silvery white
metal that takes on a high polish. It belongs to the
iron group, and is hard, malleable, and ductile. It occurs combined with
sulfur in millerite, with
arsenic in the mineral
niccolite, and with arsenic and
sulfur in
nickel glance.
On account of its permanence in air and inertness to
oxidation, it is used in the smaller coins, for plating
iron,
brass, etc., for chemical apparatus, and in certain alloys, as German silver. It is magnetic, and is very frequently accompanied by
cobalt, both being found in
meteoric iron. It is chiefly valuable for the
alloys it forms, especially many
superalloys.
Nickel is one of the five
ferromagnetic elements. However, the US "nickel" coin is not magnetic, because it actually is mostly
copper, but old Canadian nickels minted until 1958 were.
The most common
oxidation state of nickel is +2, though 0, +1, +3 and +4 Ni complexes are observed. It is also thought that a +6 oxidation state may exist, however, results are inconclusive.
The unit cell of nickel is an FCC with a lattice parameter of 0.356 nm giving a radius of the atom of 0.126 nm.
Nickel-62 is the most stable nuclide of all the existing elements; it is more stable even than
Iron-56.
Nickel use is ancient, and can be traced back as far as 3500 BCE. Bronzes from what is now Syria had a nickel content of up to two percent. Further, there are Chinese manuscripts suggesting that "white
copper" (e.g. baitung) was used in the Orient between 1400 and 1700 BC. However, because the ores of nickel were easily mistaken for ores of silver, any understanding of this metal and its use dates to more contemporary times.
Minerals containing nickel (e.g. kupfernickel, or false copper) were of value for colouring glass green. In 1751, Baron
Axel Fredrik Cronstedt was attempting to extract copper from kupfernickel (now called niccolite), and obtained instead a white metal that he called nickel.
Coins of pure nickel were first used 1881 in
Switzerland. [
1]
Many but not all
hydrogenases contain nickel in addition to
iron-sulfur clusters. Nickel centres are a common element in those hydrogenases whose function is to oxidise rather than evolve hydrogen. The nickel centre appears to undergo changes in oxidation state, and evidence has been presented that the nickel centre might be the active site of these enzymes.
A nickel-tetrapyrrole coenzyme, Co-F430, is present in the methyl CoM reductase and in
methanogenic bacteria. The tetrapyrrole is intermediate in structure between
porphyrin and
corrin. Changes in redox state, as well as changes in nickel coordination, have recently been observed.
There is also a nickel-containing carbon monoxide dehydrogenase. Little is known about the structure of the nickel site.
Studies on chicks and rats (the latter of which are relatively close to humans genetically) suggest that nickel is essential for proper
liver function.
The bulk of the nickel mined comes from two types of
ore deposits. The first are
laterites where the principal ore minerals are nickeliferous
limonite: (Fe,Ni)O(OH) and
garnierite (a hydrous nickel silicate): (Ni,Mg)
3Si
2O
5(OH). The second are magmatic sulfide deposits where the principal ore mineral is
pentlandite: (Ni,Fe)
9S
8.
*
see Ore genesis, :Category:Nickel mineralsIn terms of supply, the
Sudbury region of
Ontario,
Canada, produces about 30 percent of the world's supply of nickel. The
Sudbury Basin deposit is theorized to have been created by a massive
meteorite impact event early in the
geologic history of Earth. Russia contains about 40% of the world's known resources at the massive
Norilsk deposit in
Siberia. Russia mines this primarily for its own domestic supply, and for export of
palladium. Other major deposits of nickel are found in
New Caledonia,
Australia,
Cuba, and
Indonesia. The deposits in tropical areas are typically laterites which are produced by the intense weathering of
ultramafic igneous rocks and the resulting secondary concentration of nickel bearing oxide and
silicate minerals. A recent development has been the exploitation of a deposit in western
Turkey, especially convenient for European smelters, steelmakers and factories.
Based on
geophysical evidence, most of the nickel on Earth is postulated to be concentrated in the
Earth's core.
Nickel is used in many industrial and consumer products, including stainless steel, magnets, coinage, and special alloys. It is also used for plating and as a green tint in glass. Nickel is pre-eminently an alloy metal, and its chief use is in the nickel steels and nickel cast irons, of which there are innumberable varietes. It is also widely used for many other alloys, such as nickel brasses and bronzes, and alloys with copper, chromium, aluminum, lead, cobalt, silver and gold.
Nickel consumption can be summarized as: nickel steels (60%), nickel-copper alloys and nickel silver (14%), malleable nickel, nickel clad and Inconel (9%), plating (6%), nickel cast irons (3%), heat and electric resistance alloys (3%), nickel brasses and bronzes (2%), others (3%).
Nickel can be recovered using
extractive metallurgy. Most lateritic ores have traditionally been processed using
pyrometallurgical techniques to produce a matte for further refining. Recent advances in
hydrometallurgy have resulted in recent nickel processing operations being developed using these processes. Most sulphide deposits have traditionally been processed by concentration through a
froth flotation process followed by
pyrometallurgical extraction. Recent advances in hydrometallurgical processing of sulphides has led to some recent projects being built around this technology.
Nickel is extracted from its ores by conventional roasting and reduction processes which yield a metal of >75% purity. Final purification in the
Mond process to >99.99% purity is performed by reacting nickel and
carbon monoxide to form
nickel carbonyl. This gas is passed into a large chamber at a higher temperature in which tens of thousands of nickel spheres are maintained in constant motion. The nickel carbonyl decomposes depositing pure nickel onto the nickel spheres (known as pellets). Alternatively, the nickel carbonyl may be decomposed in a smaller chamber without pellets present to create fine powders. The resultant carbon monoxide is re-circulated through the process. The highly pure nickel produced by this process is known as
carbonyl nickel. A second common form of refining involves the leaching of the metal matte followed by the electro-winning of the nickel from solution by plating it onto a cathode. In many stainless steel applications, the nickel can be taken directly in the 75% purity form, depending on the presence of any impurities.
The largest producer of nickel is
Russia which extracts 267,000
tonnes of nickel per year.
Australia and
Canada (particularly the
Sudbury Basin) are the second and third largest producers, making 207 and 189.3 thousand tonnes per year.
*
Kamacite is a naturally occurring
alloy of
iron and nickel, usually in the proportion of 90:10 to 95:5 although impurities such as
cobalt or
carbon may be present. Kamacite occurs in nickel-iron meteorites.
See also nickel compounds.Naturally occurring nickel is composed of 5 stable
isotopes; 58-Ni, 60-Ni, 61-Ni, 62-Ni and 64-Ni with 58-Ni being the most abundant (68.077%
natural abundance). 18
radioisotopes have been characterised with the most stable being 59-Ni with a
half-life of 76,000 years, 63-Ni with a half-life of 100.1 years, and 56-Ni with a half-life of 6.077 days. All of the remaining
radioactive isotopes have half-lifes that are less than 60 hours and the majority of these have half lifes that are less than 30 seconds. This element also has 1
meta state.
Nickel-56 is produced in large quantities in type Ia
supernovae and the shape of the
light curve of these supernovae corresponds to the decay of nickel-56 to cobalt-56 and then to
iron-56.
Nickel-59 is a long-lived
cosmogenic radionuclide with a half-life of 76,000 years.
59Ni has found many applications in
isotope geology.
59Ni has been used to date the terrestrial age of
meteorites and to determine abundances of extraterrestrial dust in ice and
sediment. Nickel-60 is the daughter product of the extinct radionuclide
60Fe (half-life = 1.5 Myr). Because the extinct radionuclide
60Fe had such a long half-life, its persistence in materials in the
solar_system at high enough concentrations may have generated observable variations in the isotopic composition of
60Ni. Therefore, the abundance of
60Ni present in extraterrestrial material may provide insight into the origin of the solar system and its early history.
The isotopes of nickel range in
atomic weight from 48
amu (48-Ni) to 78 amu (78-Ni). Nickel-78's half-life was recently measured to be 110 milliseconds and is believed to be an important isotope involved in
supernova nucleosynthesis of elements heavier than iron. [
2]
Exposure to nickel metal and soluble compounds should not exceed 0.05 mg/cm³ in nickel equivalents per 40-hour work week. Nickel sulfide fume and dust is believed to be
carcinogenic, and various other nickel compounds may be as well.
Nickel carbonyl, [Ni(CO)
4], is an extremely toxic gas. The toxicity of metal carbonyls is a function of both the toxicity of a metal as well as the carbonyl's ability to give off highly toxic
carbon monoxide gas, and this one is no exception. It is explosive in air.
Sensitised individuals may show an
allergy to nickel affecting their skin. The amount of nickel which is allowed in products which come into contact with human skin is regulated by the
European Union. In
2002 a
report in the journal
Nature researchers found amounts of nickel being emitted by 1 and 2
Euro coins far in excess of those standards. This is believed to be due to a galvanic reaction.
*
Los Alamos National Laboratory – Nickel* Production and consumption figures are from,
The Economist: Pocket World in Figures 2005, Profile Books (2005), ISBN 1-86197-799-9
*
Current Nickel Price*
National Pollutant Inventory - Nickel and compounds Fact Sheet*
WebElements.com – Ni*
Article in Nature on nickel emitted by euro coins*
London Metal Exchange*
European Nickel plc*
IARC Monograph "Nickel and Nickel compounds"*
Tutorial - joining nickel alloys (pdf format)
