pyriodic-table 1.0.1

A package which provides data on the Periodic Table of Elements.

--- pyriodic_table ---

pyriodic_table is a simple Python package which aims to achieve the following:

• Provide insightful data (as accurate as possible) on the 118 chemical elements discovered to date, starting with hydrogen, all the way to the super-heavy oganesson!
• Make this data easily accessible, in an organised manner.
• Allow easy identification of elements to access their data, through multiple methods.
• Be user-friendly and easy to use.

The PyPi page for the package is: https://pypi.org/project/pyriodic-table/

About the data

Various data points are provided for each element.

Data Categories

Name

This is simply what the element is called, and is self-explanatory.

For example, the first element is called hydrogen.

Symbol

This is the abbrevation for an element, consisting of one or two Latin letters, and starting with a capital letter. It is much more convenient than having to refer to an element's name.

For example, the symbol for hydrogen is 'H', and the symbol for gold is 'Au' (aurum).

As in the example of gold, element symbols can be misleading and not so obvious as to which element they represent.

Atomic number

This is just the number of protons in an atom's nucleus (which also happens to be the number of electrons in an atom's shells - to cancel out the positive charge of the protons). In addition, the atomic number indicates the nth element.

For example, hydrogen has an atomic number of 1 and is the 1st element. And oganesson has an atomic number of 118 and is the 118th element.

Atomic mass

This is how heavy on average an atom of an element is, compared to the carbon-12 isotope, which has an atomic mass of exactly 12. For example, if element X has an isotope with mass number of 25 (50% of element X), and an isotope with mass number of 27 (50% of element X), element X would have an atomic mass of 26. If an element has no stable isotopes, the mass number of its longest-lived isotope is considered to be its atomic mass.

For example, hydrogen has an atomic mass of 1.008, and astatine, the rarest natural element, has an atomic mass of 210 (astatine-210 has the longest half life of all astatine radioisotopes).

Electrons per shell

This is the number of electrons in each energy level of an atom. For example, hydrogen has only one electron and thus only 1 shell: (1,). But potassium has 19 electrons: (2, 8, 8, 1).

State

This refers to what form the matter of an element takes at room temperature, either solid, liquid or gas.

For example, oxygen is obviously a gas at room temperature, and equally unsurprisingly, iron is a solid at room temperature.

Surprisingly, only two elements are liquids at room temperature: bromine and mercury.

Group

A group in the periodic table is a vertical column of elements. Most elements belong in a group, but some elements, including certain lanthanides (e.g lanthanum), are not put into one. Some groups also have special names, including:

• Group 1 - alkali metals (e.g sodium) [Be careful, hydrogen is also in group 1 but certainly is not a metal.]
• Group 2 - alkaline earth metals (e.g calcium)
• Group 17 - halogens (e.g iodine)
• Group 18 - noble gases (e.g helium)

Period

A period is a horizontal row of elements. For example, hydrogen is in period 1 and copper is in period 4.

Melting point

This is the temperature at which an element turns from a solid into a liquid. It varies significantly over different elements. The three temperature units: Kelvin (K), Celsius (°C) and Fahrenheit (°F) are all supported.

For example, hydrogen has a melting point of 13.99 K / -259.16 °C / -434.488 °F; and titanium has a melting point of 1941 K / 1667.85 °C / 3034.13 °F.

Boiling point

This is the temperature at which an element turns from a liquid into a gas. It varies significantly over different elements. Like melting point, all three temperature units are supported.

For example, hydrogen has a boiling point of 20.271 K / -252.897 °C / -423.1822 °F; and titanium has a boiling point of 3560 K / 3286.86 °C / 5948.33 °F.

Density

This is the mass per unit volume of an element at room temperature. Gases have an extremely low density compared to solids and liquids. The unit used by all elements is nonetheless g/cm³.

For example, hydrogen has a density of only 0.00008988 g/cm³, whilst osmium has a whopping density of 22.59 g/cm³.

Natural?

This refers to whether or not an element can be found naturally and is not synthetic (man-made). As long as an element exists in extremely trace quantities, it counts as natural, so this includes technetium and promethium!

For example, carbon is certainly found naturally, whilst americium is synthetic.

Has stable isotope?

This refers to whether or not an element can be stable. If an element does not have at least one stable isotope, it is radioactive. Note that elements which have at least have one stable isotope certainly can also have several radioisotopes.

For example, tin has many stable isotopes, whilst uranium is radioactive.

Discovery

This refers to the person/people or place(s) that first found the element, either through nature or synthetically.

For example, Henry Cavendish discovered hydrogen, but Riken (a large scientific research institute in Japan) discovered nihonium.

Discovery year

Self-explanatory! This refers to the year of element discovery. For example, hydrogen was discovered in 1766 (by Cavendish), and nihonium was discovered relatively recently - in 2004.

Data accuracy, completeness and reliability

Element data has been manually obtained and entered carefully, from various sources, including:

• Wikipedia pages for each element.
• Royal Society of Chemistry - https://www.rsc.org/periodic-table

Unfortunately, many elements have missing data, such as melting/boiling points and density. Furthermore, particular data for certain elements may be inaccurate.

Nonetheless, the common elements likely have high-quality accurate data, and conveniently, they are the most used. For example, unsurprisingly oxygen, an abundant element we need for respiration is much better known than livermorium, a synthetic, radioactive, short-lived element of which only a few atoms have been produced.

Compatability

Python 3.9 or greater is supported.