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In a recent article (1) ranking the countries by the
number of elements discovered, it is stated that only one
element, and not three as usually accepted, was discovered in
Spain. Apparently the author takes the geographic view that
elements are discovered by the country
in which they are discovered. According to this, helium was discovered by the Sun!
The usual view is that elements are discovered by
persons who are nationals of a given country. Going a step
further, in his ranking of countries by number of Nobel
Prize winners, Asimov (2) uses the criterion that in case of
doubt "the key point is a man's scientific birth and that this
takes place in college". So, he assigns Albert Einstein to
Switzerland, because that is the country where he received his
undergraduate training.
There is no doubt in the present case: three
elements were discovered by Spanish nationals born and educated
in Spain. The brothers Fausto and Juan José de Elhúyar,
working in Spain, discovered tungsten or wolfram in 1783.
Antonio de Ulloa, an officer in the Spanish Navy,
discovered platinum during a scientific expedition in what is now
Colombia, and then part of the Virreinato de Nueva
Granada, in 1753. And Manuel del Río, a Spanish scientist
appointed as professor in the School of Mines in Mexico, then part
of the Virreinato de Nueva España, discovered vanadium
in 1801. Due credit is given to these Spanish scientists for
the discovery of the said elements in the section "The
Elements" of the CRC Handbook of Chemistry and
Physics (3).
Literature Cited
- Thomsen, V. J. Chem.
Educ. 1996, 73, 937.
- Asimov, I. Asimov on
Chemistry; Macdonald and Jane's: London, 1975; p 216.
- CRC Handbook of Chemistry and Physics,
19951996, 76th ed.; Lide, D. R., Ed.; CRC: Boca Raton, FL, 1995.
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