• Question: what elements mixed together make the prettiest colour?

    Asked by gunna to Lilly on 18 Mar 2014.
    • Photo: Lilian Hunt

      Lilian Hunt answered on 18 Mar 2014:

      I wouldn’t have a clue exactly!

      The only thing I can think of is in fireworks, we use specific elements for the different colours and they’re quite pretty 🙂 I think these are some of them:

      Aluminium for silver and white
      Barium for green
      Copper for blue
      Lithium for red
      Sodium for gold/yellow

Comments

  • Photo: Rowena

    Rowena commented on :

    It depends very much upon the the charge of the elements. Electrons are in “shells” that want to be full or empty, so they lose or gain electrons to do this.

    When metals lose electrons they form +ve ions that then make ionic compounds. Group I and II metals are mostly white so quite boring (except examples above), but transition metals can be stable with many different charges and each charge has a different colour.

    I work with chromium. Cr(+6) is a bright orange, Cr(+3) is a bright green and Cr(+2) is blue. Vanadium is also especially colourful. My favourite is the deep purple of potassium permanganate, which comes from the manganese element carrying a +7 charge!

  • Photo: Rowena

    Rowena commented on :

    (I am a colour zone chemist – come over to our zone with your colour questions: we’re all keen to answer!)