 Discovery Information
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| Who: Known to the ancients. Copper has played a significant part in the history of mankind, which has used the easily accessible
uncompounded metal for nearly 10,000 years. Civilizations in places like Iraq, China, Egypt, Greece and the Sumerian cities all have early evidence of using copper, Britain and the United States also have extensive histories of copper use and mining.
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| Name Origin
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| Latin: cyprium (island of Cyprus famed for its copper mines). |
| "Copper" in different languages. |
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| Sources
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| Pure copper occurs rarely in nature. Usually copper found in such minerals as azurite (Cu3(CO3)2(OH)2), malachite (Cu2CO3(OH)2) and bornite (Cu5FeS4) and in sulfides as in chalcopyrite (CuFeS2), coveline (CuS), chalcosine (Cu2S) or oxides like cuprite (Cu2O). Copper is obtained by smelting, leaching and by electrolysis.
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| Annual production is around 6.5 million tons. Primary mining areas are in the USA, Zaire, Zambia, Canada, Chile, Cyprus, Russia and Australia.
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| Abundance
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| Universe: 0.06 ppm (by weight) |
| Sun: 0.7 ppm (by weight) |
| Carbonaceous meteorite: 110 ppm |
| Earth's Crust: 50 ppm |
| Seawater: |
| Atlantic surface: 8 x 10-5 ppm
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| Atlantic deep: 1.2 x 10-4 ppm
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| Pacific surface: 8 x 10-5 ppm
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| Pacific deep: 2.8 x 10-4 ppm
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| Human: |
| 1000 ppb by weight |
| 99 ppb by atoms |
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| Uses
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| Most often used as an electrical conductor. Its alloys are used in jewellery, bronze sculptures and for coins. The skin of the Statue of Liberty is made of copper (81.3 tonnes).
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| Copper(II) sulfate (CuSO4).5H2O) is used as a fungicide and as algae control in domestic lakes and ponds. It is used in gardening powders and sprays to
kill mildew.
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| As a material in the manufacture of computer heatsinks, as a result of its superior heat dissipation capacity to aluminium.
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| Bacteria will not grow on a copper surface because it is biostatic. Copper doorknobs are used by hospitals to reduce the transfer
of disease, and Legionnaire's Disease is suppressed by copper tubing in air-conditioning systems.
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| History
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| Copper, as native copper, is one of the few metals to naturally occur as an uncompounded mineral. Copper was known to some
of the oldest civilizations on record, and has a history of use that is at least 10,000 years old. A copper pendant was found
in what is now northern Iraq that dates to 8700 BC. By 5000 BC, there are signs of copper smelting, the refining of copper
from simple copper compounds such as malachite or azurite. Among archaeological sites in Anatolia, Catal Hoyuk (~6000 BC)
features native copper artifacts and smelted lead beads, but no smelted copper. But Can Hasan (~5000 BCE) had access to smelted copper; this site has yielded the oldest known
cast copper artifact, a copper mace head.
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| Copper smelting appears to have been developed independently in several parts of the world. In addition to its development
in Anatolia by 5000 BCE, it was developed in China before 2800 BCE, in the Andes around 2000 BCE, in Central America around 600 AD, and in West Africa around 900 AD. Copper
is found extensively in the Indus Valley Civilization by the 3rd millennium BC. In Europe, Otzi the Iceman, a well-preserved
male dated to 3200 BC, was found with a copper-tipped axe whose metal was 99.7% pure. High levels of arsenic in his hair suggest he was involved in copper smelting. There are copper and bronze artifacts from Sumerian cities that date
to 3000 BC, and Egyptian artifacts of copper and copper-tin alloys nearly as old. In one pyramid, a copper plumbing system was found that is 5000
years old. The Egyptians found that adding a small amount of tin made the metal easier to cast, so bronze alloys were found in Egypt almost as soon as copper was found. In the Americas production in the Old Copper Complex, located in present day Michigan
and Wisconsin, was dated back to between 6000 to 3000 BC.
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| The use of bronze became so pervasive in a certain era of civilization that it has been named the Bronze Age. The transitional
period in certain regions between the preceding Neolithic period and the Bronze Age is termed the Chalcolithic ("copper-stone"),
with some high-purity copper tools being used alongside stone tools. Brass was known to the Greeks, but only became a significant
supplement to bronze during the Roman empire.
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| In Greek the metal was known by the name chalkos. Copper was a very important resource for the Romans, Greeks and other ancient
peoples. In Roman times, it became known as aes Cyprium (aes being the generic Latin term for copper alloys such as bronze
and other metals, and Cyprium because so much of it was mined in Cyprus). From this, the phrase was simplified to cuprum and
then eventually Anglicized into the English copper. Copper was associated with the goddess Aphrodite/Venus in mythology and
alchemy, owing to its lustrous beauty, its ancient use in producing mirrors, and its association with Cyprus, which was sacred
to the goddess. In alchemy the symbol for copper was also the symbol for the planet Venus.
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| Notes
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| Copper is essential in all higher plants and animals. Copper is carried mostly in the bloodstream on a plasma protein called
ceruloplasmin. When copper is first absorbed in the gut it is transported to the liver bound to albumin. Copper is found in
a variety of enzymes.
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| Copper is a very interesting element. It is one of the transition elements that actually uses electrons from one of the inner orbitals in chemical reactions. In addition, it has more than one oxidation
state. Like many of the transition elements, copper has a coloured ion. Copper typically forms a bluish green solution. Copper
(Cu) has two valences Cu I (cuprous) has one valence electron and Cu II (cupric) has two valence electrons. Copper was one of the earliest known metals, having reportedly been mined for
over 5000 years. In nature it has two isotopes, 63 (69.09%), which has 29 electrons and protons and 34 neutrons, and 65 (30.91%), which has 29 electrons and protons and 36 neutrons. Brass and bronze are alloys of copper.
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| Hazards
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| When powdered, the metal is a fire hazard (may react explosively with strong oxidizing agents), it may also cause respiratory
irritation. All copper compounds are toxic. Thirty grams of copper sulfate is potentially lethal in humans.
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