Author Archives: clareewilkes

Titanium was named for the Titans of Greek mythology, following the naming of uranium after Uranus, father of the Titans. It shares with the Titans the property of strength, and in combination with its low density and heat resistance, this makes it ideal for use in aircraft and spacecraft, often alloyed with aluminium, zirconium, nickelContinue reading “Titanium toilets”

If you’ve ever strolled around the Beacon Hill or Back Bay area of Boston, Massachusetts, you may have come across windows with panes of distinctly purple glass. These panes date from the mid 1800s when manganese dioxide was commonly added to glass as a decolouriser. Glass made from pure silicon dioxide is naturally colourless, butContinue reading “Purple haze”

Iron is the last of the seven metal elements known since antiquity that I have stitched, the others being gold, silver, lead, mercury, copper and tin. Iron was linked to the god Mars, bringer of war; its alchemical symbol is thought to derive from a shield and spear and is the symbol we now useContinue reading “Alchemical symbols”

Molybdenum is a trace element – one required by the human body but only in small quantities. It is essential for the function of three different metabolic enzymes and thankfully deficiency is rare as it is found in most foodstuffs. Legumes are particularly high in molybdenum: it’s well worth giving peas a chance.

“Proclaim Liberty Throughout All the Land Unto All the Inhabitants thereof” This quotation from Leviticus 25:10 is cast into the Liberty Bell, an iconic symbol of American independence. The words resonate today, the day that Joe Biden was inaugurated as the 46th President of the United States of America. I stitched this bell pattern whileContinue reading “Americium”

Today two metals adjacent in the sixth period of the Periodic Table, rhenium and osmium, and in common with their neighbours, iridium, tungsten and platinum, they are very dense. In fact, osmium is the most dense element of all, narrowly pipping iridium. Osmium has few uses as it is rare and hard to work with.Continue reading “Nibs and blades”

Tantalum and niobium lie one below the other in Group V of the Periodic Table. They were discovered within a year of each other, in 1802 and 1801 respectively, though for a while there was some confusion as to whether they were one and the same element or indeed whether there was a third distinctContinue reading “Tragic Greeks”

Today two patterns based on electrical symbols to represent applications of tungsten (left) and ruthenium (right). Tungsten has the highest melting point of all metals. It was used extensively in the filaments of incandescent light bulbs throughout the 20th century and so I have based my pattern on a electrical symbol for an incandescent bulb.Continue reading “Bulbs and switches”

I hesitated for a moment over whether to use a Star of David to represent meitnerium as Lise Meitner did not count herself Jewish by religion and as a young woman was baptised in to the Protestant church, but nevertheless she was ethnically Jewish and this had an enormous impact on her later life. MeitnerContinue reading “Meitnerium”