Gold is a yellow metal that’s very chemically stable. This means that it does not corrode or tarnish easily, and is very useful in electronics.
However, you don’t need to be a scientist to know that gold isn’t actually a mineral. There are many different classifications that can be used to describe it, including an elemental or transition metal mineral and a metal.
Physical Properties
Gold is a soft, dense, ductile and malleable metal that has many physical properties. It can be beaten into thin sheets and can be stretched into very long wires that are just a few atoms thick.
Gold also has high corrosion resistance and a high level of electrical conductivity. These properties make it popular for use in corrosion-resistant electrical connectors (its chief industrial application).
In nature, gold is found in free elemental form, in small nuggets or grains, and as mineral inclusions in rocks. It is often naturally alloyed with silver. The color of pure gold is golden-yellow to red-brown, and it whitens as it is alloyed with silver.
Gold is a very conductive metal that conducts electricity better than copper and silver. It also does not tarnish like these metals do. It is also unaffected by air and most reagents.
Chemical Properties
Gold is a group 11 metal, one of the least chemically reactive of the transition elements. It is unaffected by oxygen, sulfur, hydrofluoric acid, and nitric acid. It forms a tetrachlorocuprate anion in aqua regia (a 1:3 mixture of nitric and hydrochloric acids).
In a mass, it has a yellow colour; finely divided it can be black, ruby, or purple. It is the most malleable and ductile of all metals, able to be beaten into thin sheets covering up to 300 square feet.
It is a good conductor of heat and electricity, and does not tarnish when it is exposed to the air. It is widely used as a conductor in electrical connections because of its high malleability and ductility, as well as its corrosion resistance.
Economical Properties
Gold is a very useful metal and is used in a wide variety of applications. The most obvious use is as a precious metal in jewelry, but it can also be used to make small devices such as cell phones and computers.
Unlike many other metals, gold is malleable and can be beaten into extremely detailed shapes. It is also a good conductor of heat and electricity.
It has an extremely high luster and can be alloyed with other metals to create new types of jewelry. It is also a durable material that does not rust or tarnish.
Because gold does not tarnish, rot, or decay, it resists entropy, one of the most important natural laws that affect everything made up of energy. As a result, all the gold ever extracted has been stored in the form of a physical stock (equivalent inventory) owned by hundreds of millions of people in jewelry or bullion form.
Origin
Gold is a rare and precious yellow metal found in rocks and in the oceans. It is a valuable material due to its rarity, resistance to corrosion, electrical conductivity, malleability and ductility.
It is also very beautiful and durable. This makes it an excellent material to use in jewelry, and in many other industrial applications.
Scientists think that gold formed in stars a long time before the Earth was formed, and that this process occurred during supernovae or neutron star collisions. These events produce heavy elements through a process called neutron capture.
These fusions release a huge amount of energy, and they can combine the lighter elements into heavier ones. This fusion is what created hydrogen and helium. However, no element as heavy as gold was made this way in the early Universe. It was only later that the first stars began to fuse the heavier elements through nuclear fusion.
