33 Arsenic

Detailed Technical Data

Compare at other websites:
www.webelements.com
Los Alamos National Labs
Royal Society of Chemistry
Isotope information
Minerals
Translations and Etymology
Science Fiction (Main Site)
Poetry (Main Site)

Home Display size: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13

Arsenic is, of course, the quitessential poison of antiquity. Everyone who's anyone has been murdered with arsenic. Many people, those with a wood deck for example, have enough arsenic around the house to kill most of their neighborhood (it's used to treat wood to make it insect and rot resistant). This use is being phased out and will be banned starting in 2004, in the US. Its use in rat poison and the like was banned long ago.

Huge quantities of arsenic are used in gold mining, which is a good reason you don't want a gold mine in your back yard. It's also why arsenic is used to treat lumber even though safer treatments are available: Large amounts of waste arsenic are available cheap from the mining industry, which would have to spend a lot of money to dispose of it safely, if they couldn't sell it to people to put in their back yards.

CCA treated wood.
CCA (chromated copper arsenate) treated wood is nasty, nasty stuff.

Arsenic is very toxic. It is an acute poison, a contact poison, a chronic cumulative poison, and a carcinogen. There is no part of arsenic that is not poisonous. This sample of treated lumber would make you very sick if you ate it. A treated lumber deck has enough arsenic to kill at least a hundred people, including you. Do not use acidic deck washes. Never, never burn treated lumber.

And shop at Menards: They have eliminated arsenic from their treated lumber two years before it is due to be banned.

Source: Hardware Store
Contributor: Theodore Gray
Acquired: 15 April, 2002
Price: Donated
Size: 3"
Purity: <5%

Native arsenic.
This sample of native (naturally occurring) arsenic is from the Burraton Coombe Quarry, St. Stephen-by-Saltash, Cornwall, in the UK.
It happened to arrive in my mailbox on the very day Oliver Sacks was visiting the Periodic Table Table, so we got to open it together.
Source: Andrew Goodall
Contributor: Andrew Goodall
Acquired: 12 November, 2002
Price: Donated
Size: 1"
Purity: >80%

Sample from the Red Green and Blue Company Element Set.
The Red Green and Blue company in England sells a very nice element collection in several versions. Max Whitby, the director of the company, very kindly donated a complete set to the periodic table table.

To learn more about the set you can visit my page about element collecting for a general description or the company's website which includes many photographs and pricing details. I have two photographs of each sample from the set: One taken by me and one from the company. You can see photographs of all the samples displayed in a periodic table format: my pictures or their pictures. Or you can see both side-by-side with bigger pictures in numerical order.

For most sample from this set I have my own picture on the left and the one from the company here, but I haven't taken a picture of this sample yet so there's only one picture.

Source: Max Whitby of The Red Green & Blue Company
Contributor: Max Whitby of The Red Green & Blue Company
Acquired: 25 January, 2003
Price: Donated
Size: 0.2"
Purity: 99.99999%

Sample from the Everest Element Set.
Up until the early 1990's a company in Russia sold a periodic table collection with element samples. At some point their American distributor sold off the remaining stock to a man who is now selling them on eBay. The samples (excepted gasses) weight about 0.25 grams each, and the whole set comes in a very nice wooden box with a printed periodic table in the lid.

To learn more about the set you can visit my page about element collecting for a general description and information about how to buy one, or you can see photographs of all the samples from the set displayed on my website in a periodic table layout or with bigger pictures in numerical order.

Source: Rob Accurso
Contributor: Rob Accurso
Acquired: 7 February, 2003
Price: Donated
Size: 0.2"
Purity: >99%

Pure arsenic.
David Franco feels bad when I have impure samples, so he sent me this nice chunk of pure arsenic. I suppose normally if someone mails you arsenic it's considered a bad sign....
Source: David Franco
Contributor: David Franco
Acquired: 20 January, 2003
Price: Donated
Size: 0.5"
Purity: 99.8%

Native arsenic. (External Sample)
Naturally occurring elemental arsenic.
Location: The Harvard Museum of Natural History
Photographed: 2 October, 2002
Size: 2
Purity: >90%

Native arsenic. (External Sample)
Naturally occurring elemental arsenic.
Location: The Harvard Museum of Natural History
Photographed: 2 October, 2002
Size: 3
Purity: >90%