The composition and determination of cerium oxalate / by Frederick B. Power and Frank Shedden.

  • Frederick Belding Power
Date:
[1900]
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: The composition and determination of cerium oxalate / by Frederick B. Power and Frank Shedden. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    THE COMPOSITION AND DETERMINATION OF CERIUM OXALATE. BY FREDERICK B. POWER, Ph.D., and FRANK SHEDDEN, B.Sc., A.I.C. The salts of cerium appear to have been first brought to notice as medicinal agents in 1854 by Sir James Y, Simpson l“ Note on the therapeutic action of salts of cerium,” in the Lond. and Edin.Monthly J., 1854, 5G4), who recommended the use of the nitrate, and about five years later the oxalate (Med. Times and Gaz. 19, 280), which has since been chiefly employed. Cerium oxalate was recognised by the British Pharmacopoeia in 1867, by that of the United States in 1870, and it still maintains a place in the present editions of those works, as also in the Pharmacopoeias of several other countries. Apart from the use of this salt in medicine, cerium has become of considerable importance during the past few years on account of the technical uses of the nitrate, since a mixture of one part of the latter with 90 parts of thorium nitrate constitutes the preparation employed for impregnating the familiar incandescent gas mantles. This application of cerium has given an impulse to the development or perfec¬ tion of methods for its separation from the earths with which it occurs associated, especially lanthanum and didymium, and, while thus materially extending our know¬ ledge of these elements, it has also practically created a new branch of chemical industry (compare “ Contributions to the chemistry of Cerium,” by L. M. Dennis and W. II. Magee, in J. Amer. Chem. 8oc. 1894, 649—664, and especially “ Beitrage zur Kenntniss der Ceriterden,” by Otto N. Witt and Walter Theel, Ber. 1900, 1315—1324). The cerium compounds were formerly obtained chiefly from cerite, which occurs in considerable amounts in Sweden, and affords at least 50 per cent, of cerium oxide. The thorium salts were obtained from the mineral thorite, which is found in Norway, and contains about 60—70 per cent, of its peculiar earth. According to Prof. O.N.Witt (lor. cit.), of the Charlottenburg Technical High School, who has given much attention to the technology of these rare earths, it was soon found that the supplies of thorite were not suffi ■ cient to even approximately meet the demand for thorium salts required for the incandescent gas-mantle industry. p 904. A