Is there any table of toxicity of the elements?

Such as pure elements when ingested.

I’m interested in how the toxicity of various elements compare. eg. copper vs lead vs mercury; or iron vs nickel; or gallium vs germanium; or molybdenum vs manganese vs other metals, or antimony vs tellurium.

Clearly some elements are exceedingly toxic, eg plutonium (radioactive), francium (explosive)
Other elements quite toxic, eg. phosphorus, arsenic
Other elements pretty safe, eg. krypton, hydrogen, zinc, carbon
But where do other elements slot into the picture, eg. cadmium, chromium, sulfur, magnesium, aluminium, etc.

To be thorough, there would be several tables:

• Pure element ingested as a tablet (in an undamaged digestive system)
• Pure element inhaled
• Pure element injected
• Organo-metallic

70 SSR December 2019, 101(375) The periodic table The periodic table of danger
Michael Hal Sosabowski, Michael Stephens and John Emsley
https://www.ase.org.uk/system/files/SSR_December_2019_070-076_Sosabowski.pdf

This one lists

Antimony
Arsenic
Bromine
Cadmium
Fluorine
Chlorine
Iodine
Lead
Mercury
Selenium
Tellurium
Thallium
Tin
Zinc

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4427717/

this one lists

Aluminium
Chromium
Iron

https://www.thoughtco.com/worst-elements-on-the-periodic-table-3989077

this on lists

Francium

any element from atomic number 84, polonium, all the way to element 118, oganesson

and + now I would imagine

https://www.howitworksdaily.com/10-deadly-elements/

this one lists

Hydrogen
Caesium

mollwollfumble said:

Is there any table of toxicity of the elements?

Such as pure elements when ingested.

I’m interested in how the toxicity of various elements compare. eg. copper vs lead vs mercury; or iron vs nickel; or gallium vs germanium; or molybdenum vs manganese vs other metals, or antimony vs tellurium.

Clearly some elements are exceedingly toxic, eg plutonium (radioactive), francium (explosive)
Other elements quite toxic, eg. phosphorus, arsenic
Other elements pretty safe, eg. krypton, hydrogen, zinc, carbon
But where do other elements slot into the picture, eg. cadmium, chromium, sulfur, magnesium, aluminium, etc.

To be thorough, there would be several tables:

• Pure element ingested as a tablet (in an undamaged digestive system)
• Pure element inhaled
• Pure element injected
• Organo-metallic
  

I would think sodium would be right up there

dv said:

mollwollfumble said:

Is there any table of toxicity of the elements?

Such as pure elements when ingested.

I’m interested in how the toxicity of various elements compare. eg. copper vs lead vs mercury; or iron vs nickel; or gallium vs germanium; or molybdenum vs manganese vs other metals, or antimony vs tellurium.

Clearly some elements are exceedingly toxic, eg plutonium (radioactive), francium (explosive)
Other elements quite toxic, eg. phosphorus, arsenic
Other elements pretty safe, eg. krypton, hydrogen, zinc, carbon
But where do other elements slot into the picture, eg. cadmium, chromium, sulfur, magnesium, aluminium, etc.

To be thorough, there would be several tables:

• Pure element ingested as a tablet (in an undamaged digestive system)
• Pure element inhaled
• Pure element injected
• Organo-metallic
  

I would think sodium would be right up there

Phosphorous too.

roughbarked said:

dv said:

mollwollfumble said:

Is there any table of toxicity of the elements?

Such as pure elements when ingested.

I’m interested in how the toxicity of various elements compare. eg. copper vs lead vs mercury; or iron vs nickel; or gallium vs germanium; or molybdenum vs manganese vs other metals, or antimony vs tellurium.

Clearly some elements are exceedingly toxic, eg plutonium (radioactive), francium (explosive)
Other elements quite toxic, eg. phosphorus, arsenic
Other elements pretty safe, eg. krypton, hydrogen, zinc, carbon
But where do other elements slot into the picture, eg. cadmium, chromium, sulfur, magnesium, aluminium, etc.

To be thorough, there would be several tables:

• Pure element ingested as a tablet (in an undamaged digestive system)
• Pure element inhaled
• Pure element injected
• Organo-metallic
  

I would think sodium would be right up there

Phosphorous too.

Can’t iimagine anyone enjoying drinking nitrogen.

Plutonium in minute amounts will kill you. Not immediately though, you have to suffer for a while.

Spiny Norman said:

Plutonium in minute amounts will kill you. Not immediately though, you have to suffer for a while.

Polonium as well.

Radioactivity: The obviously dangerous elements are those which are highly radioactive. While radioisotopes can be made from any element, you’d do well to steer clear of any element from atomic number 84, polonium, all the way to element 118, oganesson (which is so new it was only named in 2016).

Toxicity: Some elements are dangerous because of their inherent toxicity. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) defines a toxic chemical as any substance which can be considered harmful to the environment or hazardous to health if inhaled, ingested, or absorbed through the skin.

Reactivity: Some elements present a risk due to extreme reactivity. The most reactive elements and compounds can ignite spontaneously—or even explosively, and generally burn in water as well as in the air.Reactivity: Some elements present a risk due to extreme reactivity. The most reactive elements and compounds can ignite spontaneously—or even explosively, and generally burn in water as well as in the air.

I’m sure you can get detailed into on each element information on the safety, hazards, handling and storage somewhere.

Swallow pure potassium and you’ll hear the original K-pop

>>>Other elements pretty safe, eg. krypton, hydrogen, zinc

Zinc ?

Is there nothing it can’t do ?

Thomo said:

>>>Other elements pretty safe, eg. krypton, hydrogen, zinc

Zinc ?

Is there nothing it can’t do ?

Actually zinc has me puzzled. I’ve seen it listed as less dangerous than iron.
But I’ve also seen it listed among “heavy metal toxins”

> sodium, potassium

Yes, though not quite as deadly as francium.

mollwollfumble said:

Thomo said:

>>>Other elements pretty safe, eg. krypton, hydrogen, zinc

Zinc ?

Is there nothing it can’t do ?

Actually zinc has me puzzled. I’ve seen it listed as less dangerous than iron.
But I’ve also seen it listed among “heavy metal toxins”

> sodium, potassium

Yes, though not quite as deadly as francium.

Heavy metals are toxic but some may be essential to our lives iin small doses.

mollwollfumble said:

Actually zinc has me puzzled. I’ve seen it listed as less dangerous than iron.

FWIW have a look at a breakfast cereal packet that mentions added iron. Give it a shake with a magnet at the bottom and you’ll see tiny flecks of iron where the magnet is. Yep, they literally add tiny bits of iron to it.

Spiny Norman said:

Plutonium in minute amounts will kill you. Not immediately though, you have to suffer for a while.

There seem to be a number of counterexamples of this; between 1945 and 1947 eighteen people aged 4 to 69 were injected with plutonium. Subjects who were chosen for the experiment had been diagnosed with a terminal disease. They lived from six days up to 44 years past the time of their injection. Eight of the 18 died within two years of the injection. All died from their preexisting terminal illness or cardiac illnesses. None died from the plutonium itself. Albert Stevens was injected with 131kBq of Pu (without his knowledge or consent,) but survived for more than 20 years without apparent ill-effects. Ebb Cade was injected with ²³⁹Pu in 1945; he lived for another 8 years, also with no apparent ill-effects.

Donald Mastick, a chemist who worked on the Manhattan Project, accidentally swallowed a small amount of PuCl₃, which was detectable for the next thirty years of his life, but appeared to suffer no ill effects.

Do the condutions under which an element is toxic need to be specified? Exempli gratia, at high partial pressure, oxygen is toxic.

My favourite is thallium – no one ever suspects. Antimony sulphide is another. Polonium is just devious.

As poisons go 1080 is a good one

Invented by the nazis as a chemical warfare agent then proposed to kill concentration camp prisoners. Rejected by the nazis , now proudly used by Australian farmers and gov agencies to annihilate all species. They bait bananas with it up north and wonder why the cassowary is going extinct – stupid bastards

wookiemeister said:

As poisons go 1080 is a good one

Invented by the nazis as a chemical warfare agent then proposed to kill concentration camp prisoners. Rejected by the nazis , now proudly used by Australian farmers and gov agencies to annihilate all species. They bait bananas with it up north and wonder why the cassowary is going extinct – stupid bastards

Oooh, Wookie is going off on some sort of deranged ramble again. Let’s hope that at least this time he will provide some refs.

Here’s mine:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sodium_fluoroacetate

I’m not so sure that the Nazi’s were in SW Australia 50,000 years ago to invent this stuff, but ok.

Kingy said:

wookiemeister said:

As poisons go 1080 is a good one

Invented by the nazis as a chemical warfare agent then proposed to kill concentration camp prisoners. Rejected by the nazis , now proudly used by Australian farmers and gov agencies to annihilate all species. They bait bananas with it up north and wonder why the cassowary is going extinct – stupid bastards

Oooh, Wookie is going off on some sort of deranged ramble again. Let’s hope that at least this time he will provide some refs.

Here’s mine:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sodium_fluoroacetate

I’m not so sure that the Nazi’s were in SW Australia 50,000 years ago to invent this stuff, but ok.

Eat some and let me know how you go

wookiemeister said:

Kingy said:

wookiemeister said:

As poisons go 1080 is a good one

Invented by the nazis as a chemical warfare agent then proposed to kill concentration camp prisoners. Rejected by the nazis , now proudly used by Australian farmers and gov agencies to annihilate all species. They bait bananas with it up north and wonder why the cassowary is going extinct – stupid bastards

Oooh, Wookie is going off on some sort of deranged ramble again. Let’s hope that at least this time he will provide some refs.

Here’s mine:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sodium_fluoroacetate

I’m not so sure that the Nazi’s were in SW Australia 50,000 years ago to invent this stuff, but ok.

Eat some and let me know how you go

No refs?

Kingy said:

wookiemeister said:

As poisons go 1080 is a good one

Invented by the nazis as a chemical warfare agent then proposed to kill concentration camp prisoners. Rejected by the nazis , now proudly used by Australian farmers and gov agencies to annihilate all species. They bait bananas with it up north and wonder why the cassowary is going extinct – stupid bastards

Oooh, Wookie is going off on some sort of deranged ramble again. Let’s hope that at least this time he will provide some refs.

Here’s mine:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sodium_fluoroacetate

I’m not so sure that the Nazi’s were in SW Australia 50,000 years ago to invent this stuff, but ok.

Looking it up. 1080. Sure that’s not a TV resolution?

Sodium fluoroacetate is an organofluorine chemical compound with the formula FCH₂CO₂Na. This colourless salt has a taste similar to that of sodium chloride and is used as a rodenticide. Both sodium and potassium salts are derivatives of fluoroacetic acid.

Sodium fluoride and acetic acid are both pretty harmless.
Naturally-occurring and found in more than 30 species of native Australian plants.
It is is safe in the environment, as it dilutes into harmless compounds in water and gets eaten by the bacteria in soil.

Inhibiting the Krebs cycle by reacting with Coenzyme A.

Tau.Neutrino said:

70 SSR December 2019, 101(375) The periodic table The periodic table of danger
Michael Hal Sosabowski, Michael Stephens and John Emsley
https://www.ase.org.uk/system/files/SSR_December_2019_070-076_Sosabowski.pdf

This one lists

Antimony
Arsenic
Bromine
Cadmium
Fluorine
Chlorine
Iodine
Lead
Mercury
Selenium
Tellurium
Thallium
Tin
Zinc

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4427717/

this one lists

Aluminium
Chromium
Iron

https://www.thoughtco.com/worst-elements-on-the-periodic-table-3989077

this on lists

Francium

any element from atomic number 84, polonium, all the way to element 118, oganesson

and + now I would imagine

https://www.howitworksdaily.com/10-deadly-elements/

this one lists

Hydrogen
Caesium

Hi Neutrino, starting to read this now.

Antimony

• Although antimony poisoning has very similar symptoms to arsenic poisoning.
• Captain James Cook (as a medicine). Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (poisoning).
• Antimony pills were once sold as reusable laxatives. If you were constipated you would swallow one and its toxic action would irritate the intestines, causing them to discharge their contents. The pill was then retrieved and stored for future use.

That’s brilliant ! A reusable medicine.

Arsenic

• A dose of 250 mg of arsenic oxide, As2O3, will kill a human.
• Arsenic compounds a treatment for fever, syphilis and leukaemia.

Bromine

• Severe chemical burns as a liquid.
• Deadly if inhaled in large enough amounts.

Cadmium

• Cumulative poison replaces zinc in the liver.
• Safe daily intake of 70 μg.
• Cadmium exposure can come from tobacco smoking.

Chlorine

• Elemental chlorine is poisonous to all living things and has been used as far back as the 1820s as a disinfectant.
• The gas works by dissolving in the moisture in the unlucky recipient’s lungs and causing the pH to drop.

Fluorine

• Fluorine is the most reactive element of the periodic table.
• Several 19th century attempts at generating the element resulted in the deaths and maiming of several scientists
• Water spontaneously combusts in the presence of a jet of fluorine gas.

Iodine

• Iodine poisoning by ingestion is rare, as it requires a large dose.
• The gas is a strong irritant.

Lead

• Lead is poisonous because it is absorbed into the bloodstream where it interferes with the enzymes that make haemoglobin.

I, personally, found lead to be harmless when ingested in quantities like 5 mg.

Mercury

• The human intake of mercury is about 3 μg per day.
• Mercury salts have been used to treat a wide range of ailments from constipation to syphilis.

Mercury miners in olden times, and their children, used to eat metallic mercury as a dare.
I have also heard a report of miners walking across a vat of the stuff for fun.
It’s harmless to chickens when ingested.
I have heard that metallic mercury is more dangerous if its vapour is inhaled.

Plutonium

I have heard that 1 mg of plutonium is deadly when injected. Possibly a much smaller dose than that.
I haven’t heard about ingested.

Selenium

• Makes you sick but seldom causes death. The first sign is bad body odour.
• Selenium can protect against other metal toxins, especially cadmium and mercury.

Tellurium

• Tellurium is an element to avoid because of its socially isolating effect.

PMSL. Sounds like a good practical joke.

Thallium

• 500 mg ingested is a near fatal dose of thallium salt.
• Most damage to the central nervous system.

Tin

• Cases of poisoning from tin metal, its oxides and its salts are almost unknown.

Zinc

• The symptoms of zinc poisoning include damage to the nerves.
• Very few fatalities.

https://chemicalsafety.com/sds-search/

Lithium
Chemicals which, in contact with water, emit flammable gases (Category 1), H260
Skin corrosion (Category 1B), H314
Serious eye damage (Category 1), H318

Beryllium
Acute toxicity, Oral (Category 3), H301
= LD50
300 mg/kg

Boron
Acute toxicity, Oral (Category 4), H302
=LD20
2 g/kg

Carbon
Non hazardous

Magnesium
Substances/mixtures which, in contact with water, emit flammable gases (Category 2)
Non toxic, non-bioaccumulative

Aluminium

mollwollfumble said:

https://chemicalsafety.com/sds-search/

Lithium
Chemicals which, in contact with water, emit flammable gases (Category 1), H260
Skin corrosion (Category 1B), H314
Serious eye damage (Category 1), H318

Beryllium
Acute toxicity, Oral (Category 3), H301
= LD50
300 mg/kg

Boron
Acute toxicity, Oral (Category 4), H302
=LD20
2 g/kg

Carbon
Non hazardous

Magnesium
Substances/mixtures which, in contact with water, emit flammable gases (Category 2)
Non toxic, non-bioaccumulative

Aluminium
Non hazardous

Silicon
Non-hazardous, non-bioaccumulative

Phosphorus
Severe skin burns, Category 1A

Sulfur
Skin irritation, Category 2
Not dangerous if ingested.

Calcium
In contact with water releases flammable gases, Category 2
Severe skin irritation

Scandium
Severe skin burns, Category 1A

Titanium
Not a hazardous substance
Not bio-accumulative

Vanadium
Acute oral toxicity, Category 4 (LD50 is 2g/kg)
Carcinogen, Category 2 (50 mg/kg)
Bio-accumulative

Chromium
Not a hazardous substance
Not bio-accumulative

Manganese (flammable)
Not a hazardous substance

Some of these disagree with my previous knowledge. eg. I thought chromium was hazardous, for example. But SDS says otherwise.