THE BEECHMONT CREST SCIENCE ZONE
LEARNING THE CHEMICAL ELEMENTS
Sodium
Name origin: Medieval Latin sodanum = “headache remedy”
Symbol: Na
Atomic number: 11
Atomic weight: 22.9898
- Sodium is one of the top most abundant elements in the earth’s crust. Sodium oxide is the sixth most common compound on earth. Sodium also exists in abundance in seawater (in the form of sodium chloride).
-Pure sodium is a soft, white metal that can be easily cut with a knife. However, pure sodium is highly reactive in open air---so it has no practical commercial or industrial applications. In nature and in industry, sodium is virtually always encountered in the form of a compound.
-There are 14 sodium isotopes, with atomic weights between 19 and 31. Only sodium-23 occurs naturally. The other isotopes are all radioactive.
