Carbon: The Element That Becomes Diamonds, Graphite… and You

[00:00:00]Imagine a forge not made of iron and anvil, but of extreme gravity and heat, burning deep inside a dying red giant star. Here, in a chaotic inferno, something incredible delicate takes place. Three helium nuclei move at staggering speeds, must come together in just the right way, at just the right moment. By ordinary chance, they could simply fly apart. But sometimes, against all odds, they fuse. This process is known as the triple alpha process. And from this microscopic cosmic lottery comes an atom with six protons and six neutrons that we call carbon. A tiny atom that would become the foundation of biology, the architect of diamonds, the ink of history and the backbone of modern engineering. Welcome to Cube Chemistry where we will discuss all the elements of the periodic table and also do experiments. So if you like this video and want to see more, make sure to like, hype, subscribe, and hit the notification bell so you will never have to miss another episode. Also, make sure to fill in the poll in the poll section of the channel for next week as we will be discussing another element again. So, let's go back all to the beginning, the very first element we've ever discussed on the 6th of March, 2024. Back then, we were still filming at the kitchen table.

[00:01:13]The video was short, just 9 minutes, and it was nothing like the way we discuss elements today. Inside this cube, we have something black. And at first glance, it almost looks like coal. And that makes sense because this is carbon, element number six on the periodic table. And carbon is probably one of the most important elements on that table.

[00:01:33]We also have it here outside of the cube in this vial. And this form will probably look very familiar to many of you as well. Now, because carbon appears in many everyday places, including charcoal for barbecue or the remains of wood burned in a furnace, I'm wondering, can you lick it? So, let's take a look at the periodic licking table at everydaycience stuff.com. And it states, "Yes, now since I have attended many bad barbecues in my life, it's safe to say that I did lick and eat a lot of carbon." And the table therefore also states it is coal or diamond and both are chemically safe to lick. Now, for almost every element we show on Cube Chemistry, there is one question we always ask. Can you lick it? And usually the answer is please don't. But today on July 8th, we're launching the first Cube Chemistry products that you are actually supposed to eat. The Cube Chemistry Chocolate Box and the limited 118 day can you eat it advent calendar. It is our ready to eat version of the periodic table. 118 chocolates, 118 elements, and 118 tiny moments of chemistry leading all the way to August 30 to December 25th. or as we prefer to call it, Isaac Newton's birthday. Every chocolate comes wrapped as an element with a design showing whether the real element is safe, dangerous, or completely unlickable. So, while you enjoy the chocolate, you also get a small reminder that chemistry is beautiful, fascinating, and occasionally a terrible idea to put in your mouth. Now, we're only making 390 advent calendars this year. That's it. Once they are gone, they're gone. And if you order your piece before the end of July, shipping is on us. You can order the advent calendar and the chocolate box in our shop now via the link in the description. And for those who don't want to wait 118 days. Well, there's also the cube chemistry display box. The same idea, the same chemistry, but in a form that you can eat whenever you want.

[00:03:37]Now, we designed and made the products ourselves together with our supplier.

[00:03:41]And when you buy one of these legendary chocolate items, you will be helping out our channel as well. This is chemistry the cube chemistry way. Visual, curious, slightly ridiculous, and finally delicious. So, order one for yourself or your chemistry teacher or your kids or grandkids for when school starts again.

[00:03:59]Now, long before carbon could be mined from the terrestrial Earth or synthesized in a modern laboratory, it had to be forged in the stars. In the early universe following the big bang, only hydrogen, helium, and small traces of lithium existed. The pressure and temperatures of the primordial universe expanded and dropped too quickly to synthesize heavier elements. And that meant that the earlier universe had no carbon at all. It was not until the first generation of stars exhausted their primary hydrogen fuel and began to contract that the conditions for carbon nucleiosynthesis emerged. Now, when a star reaches the end of the main part of its life, it begins to swell into a red giant. Deep inside, the core starts to collapse under its own gravity. And when that happens, it gets unbelievably hot, about 100 million° C or 180 million° F.

[00:04:52]Now, at those temperatures, helium atoms are moving so violently that they can do something they normally cannot do. They can smash together and fuse. But turning helium into carbon is not simple. First, two helium nuclei clash together and form burillium 8. The problem is that burillium 8 is incredibly unstable. It falls apart almost instantly in less than a billionth of a billionth of a second. So for carbon to form, something almost impossible has to happen. A third helium nucleus has to hit that unstable burillium 8 before it disappears. Now, that sounds too unlikely to explain why carbon is everywhere in stars, planets, diamonds, graphite, and every living thing on Earth. And that is where Fred Hy comes in. In the 1950s, Hy realized that carbon could only be so common if nature had a kind of hidden shortcut, a very specific energy level inside the carbon atom that makes this reaction much more likely. Now, that energy level is called a nuclear resonance. It means the carbon nucleus forms more easily when the energies line up just right.

[00:06:00]Almost like hitting the perfect note on a musical instrument. Now, without that resonance, stars would make far less carbon. And without carbon, chemistry as we know it, including life itself, would probably not exist. I know there are theories out there about non-carbon-based life, but let's keep that out of the video for now. Now, experiments soon confirmed the existence of this exact energy level. now known as the H oil state. Had this resonance level been slightly different higher or lower in frequency, the triple alpha process would be out of tune. Now, while stars forged carbon billions of years ago, humanity's relationship with the element began much closer to home.

[00:06:40]Carbon is one of the few elements recognized since antiquity. Early human civilizations utilized it extensively in the forms of suit and charcoal, harnessing its ability to burn and its deep opaque black color to paint the walls of prehistoric caves. Now, the ethmology of the element's name speaks to this ancient relationship. The word derives directly from the Latin word carbo meaning coal or charcoal which subsequently gave rise to the French carbon. In Germanic language, the nomenclature follows an identical logic with the German colonto, the Dutch col, and the Danish kto. All literally translating to coal substance. Now, for millennia, many different physical forms of carbon were treated as completely unrelated materials. Charcoal was a fuel. Diamond, known in India and China since at least 2500 B.CE. was an invincible transparent gem, deriving its name from a corruption of the Greek Adamus, meaning the invincible.

[00:07:44]Graphite, on the other hand, was entirely misunderstood. Now, in the mid 1500s, a violent storm tore trees from the ground on the Borroale Valley in England's Lake District. Under the roots, people discovered something unusual. A huge deposit of extremely pure graphite. Now, the material was black, shiny, and left a dark mark on anything it touched. Local shepherds quickly found a use for it. They used it to mark their sheep. But at the time, nobody really knew what graphite was because it looked a bit metallic and could be used for writing. People thought it was some kind of lead or they called it plumbago, meaning leadike.

[00:08:22]That mistake still survives today in phrases like lead pencil and even in the Dutch word potload. Now, the Borondale graphite was special because it was so pure that it could simply be cut into solid sticks. This made it perfect for writing, but also valuable for something very different, lining molds for military cannonballs. Of course, we decided to destroy each other with it.

[00:08:46]Now, because of that, the mine became extremely important. The graphite was so valuable that people smuggled it, sold it on the black market, and the mine even had to be protected by armed guards. But pure natural graphite like this was rare. So in 1795, a French scientist named Nicolas Jacqu Conte came up with a clever solution. Now instead of needing perfect graphite, he mixed lower quality graphite powder with clay and baked it into a kiln. By changing the amount of clay, he could control how hard or soft the pencil would be. Now that specific invention created the modern pencil, but the real identity of graphite was still a mystery. Now in 1772, the French chemist Atwan Lavaj carried out a dramatic experiment. He used giant lenses to focus sunlight onto a diamond inside sealed containers, setting the diamond on fire. Now, this sounds like something we should do in the future. Now, the diamond disappeared, but it did not leave behind ash or liquid. Instead, it produced carbon dioxide, the same gas produced when ordinary charcoal burns. Now, this of course was a huge clue. Diamond and charcoal were somehow made of the same damn thing. Now, a few years later in 1779, the Swedish chemist Carl Wilhelm Shayla showed that graphite could also be turned into carbon dioxide. Now, this proved that graphite was not lead at all. Then in 1786 the French scientists Cloud Louie Bullet Gaspar Mong and CA Vanderond confirmed that graphite was mostly carbon. They suggested the name carbon to separate the pure element from ordinary carbon or charcoal. Finally in 1789 Lavoier listed carbon as a true chemical element in his famous chemistry textbook. And with that chemistry connected three things that seemed completely different. The black suit from a fire, the graphite in a pencil, and the hardest gemstone on Earth. All of them were carbon. Now, in the entire periodic table, no other element possesses its own dedicated branch of science. Organic chemistry is exclusively the study of carbon-based compounds, a sprawling field that dwarfs the chemistry of all the other elements combined. To understand why carbon is so extraordinarily special, we have to take a close look at its atomic structure and its subatomic geometry. Now carbon sits in group 14 of the periodic table holding atomic number six. Its electron configuration in its ground state is this meaning it possesses exactly four veence electrons in its outermost shell.

[00:11:21]According to the octet rule, atoms seek stability by having eight electrons in their veence shell. Now to achieve this stable octet a carbon atom must form four veent bonds by sharing its electrons with other atoms. This property known as tetra valency turns carbon into the ultimate atomic building block. To use an analogy, if atoms were construction toys, carbon is the highly versatile four-way interlocking connector piece that allows endless architectural expansion. But tetra vealency alone is not entirely unique.

[00:11:59]Silicon positioned directly below carbon on the periodic table also possesses four veence electrons. What elevates carbon to its unparalleled status is its moderate electro negativity combined with an extraordinarily small atomic radius. Now because the carbon atom is small, its electron orbitals can overlap highly effectively with the orbitals of adjacent atoms resulting in incredibly strong low energy covealent bonds.

[00:12:27]Furthermore, carbon possesses the rare and profound ability of ktonation, the capacity to bond endlessly with itself to form stable chains, branched networks and geometric rings. Now, while silicon can also bond to itself, silicon silicon bonds are inherently weaker and more brittle, carbonarbon bonds, by contrast are uniquely robust, allowing for the construction of colossal resilient molecular frameworks. Now, the geometry of these bonds adds a vital layer of versatility. Carbon possesses the ability to alter the shape of its electron orbitals through a process called hybridization.

[00:13:06]When a carbon atom forms four single bonds, it utilizes sp3 hybridization.

[00:13:13]The electron orbitals reconfigure to point towards the corners of a tetrahedrin. And this is the geometry found in methane and diamonds. When carbon forms a double bond, it shifts to sp2 hybridization. Three orbitals form standard single sigma bonds in a flat trional planer shape with 120° angles.

[00:13:35]While an unhybridized p orbital overlaps sideways to form a secondary pi bond.

[00:13:41]Now when carbon forms a triple bond it uses sp hybridization resulting in a highly rigid linear structure with 180° angles consisting of a sigma bond and two pi bonds. Now, the ability to seamlessly alternate between sigma and pi bonds gives carbon molecules incredible flexibility. Sigma bonds are strong and allow molecular chains to rotate freely on their axis, providing flexibility to biological membranes and long polymer chains. On the other side, pi bonds and double and triple bonds are more rigid and they restrict rotation and lock molecules into specific shapes while also providing reactivity sites where chemical interactions can easily occur.

[00:14:27]This dynamic shape-shifting bonding capability is the very reason why carbon can form both the delicate highly specific folding structures of proteins and the tough resilient backbones of synthetic plastics. Now because carbon is highly tetraalent it can assemble into several structural distinct forms composed entirely of pure carbon atoms.

[00:14:53]These different structural forms are called elotropes. The physical properties of carbon cannot be summarized in a single metric because the element represents a study of profound extremes depending entirely on how its internal atomic architecture is arranged. Now to illustrate the structural diversity you need to examine the stark contrast between carbon's two most famous natural allotropes diamond and graphite. Now in a diamond every single carbon atom is covealently bonded to four other carbon atoms in a continuous infinite 3D tetrahedral latice using sp3 hybridization. This rigid lockedin architecture leaves no free electrons and no weak spatial points. Now, consequently, diamond is a perfect electrical insulator, is highly transparent to light, and possesses the highest thermal conductivity and physical hardness of any natural bulk material. It scores a perfect 10 on the MO hardness scale, making it indispensable for industrial cutting tools and abrasives. Now, on the other side, in graphite, each carbon atom bonds to only three neighboring atoms using sp2 hybridization. This forms flat two-dimensional sheets of interlocking hexagonal rings resembling molecular chicken wire. Because only three of those four veence electrons are utilized in these primary covealent bonds, the fourth electron remains deoized, meaning it's free to float and travel rapidly above and below the carbon sheets. Now this sea of mobile electrons allows graphite to conduct electricity efficiently along its physical planes. A remarkable rare trait for a non-metal, making it ideal for battery, electrodes, and electric motor brushes. Furthermore, the individual stacked sheets of graphite are not held together by a strong covealent bond, but by weak London dispersion forces. Now, this weak intermolecular attraction allows the layers to easily slide past one another.

[00:17:00]You can think of diamond as a heavily reinforced concrete bunker while graphite is like a stack of slippery playing cards. This is why graphite is incredibly soft, opaque and functions as a excellent dry lubricant and pencil lead. Now beyond diamond and graphite, carbon's diversity extends into microscopic realm with exotic synthetic allotropes. Amorphous carbon found in everyday suit and charcoal lacks long range crystalline order entirely.

[00:17:29]presenting as a highly porous randomly structured material. In 1985, scientific interest in carbon exploded with the discovery of Buckminister ferine C60, an allotrope where 60 carbon atoms covealently bond to form a hollow sphere mathematically identical to a soccer ball. This discovery earned the 1996 Nobel Prize in chemistry and paved the way for even more advanced architectures. Soon after carbon nanot tubes were developed, microscopic rolled up cylinders of SP2 carbon that boast tensil strength dwarfing that of structural steel. More recently, the isolation of graffine, a single one atom thick isolated layer of graphite has revolutionized material science. Graphine represents the thinnest, strongest, and most thermally and electrically conductive material known to humanity. Destined to disrupt future electronics and composite materials. Now, despite these extreme differences in form, all carbon olletes share an immense resistance to thermal breakdown. Carbon does not melt into a liquid at standard atmospheric pressure.

[00:18:41]Instead, it sublimates directly into a gas at blistering temperatures approaching 3500° C or 6332° F for graphite and 4,827° C or 8720.6° F for a diamond. Now, this grants carbon an unparalleled thermal stability, explaining its extensive use in missile nose cones, rocket engines, and methological furnaces. Now, while highly versatile in its bonding, pure carbon is remarkably stable and chemically inert at standard room temperatures. It does not rust, dissolve in water, or react with acids or bases under normal environmental conditions. However, when subjected to high heat, carbon transforms into a potent chemical agent.

[00:19:27]It acts as an aggressive reducing agent, rapidly stripping oxygen atoms away from metal oxides. For instance, when heated with copper oxide, carbon claims the oxygen to form carbon dioxide gas, leaving behind pure elemental copper, a fundamental reaction that allowed early humans to smelt metal and launch the bronze and iron ages. In nature, carbon is the fourth most abundant element in the universe by mass, trailing only hydrogen, helium, and oxygen. On Earth, however, it represents a much smaller fraction of the planet's total mass.

[00:20:01]Yet, it cycles endlessly through the atmosphere, the biosphere, and the lithosphere in a process vital to all known life. Now, the vast majority of terrestrial carbon, over 99.95%, is permanently locked away deep in the Earth's crust in the form of massive sedimentary rock formations, primarily chalk, limestone, and calcium carbonate.

[00:20:23]The remaining fraction of carbon is actively circulated. Plants draw carbon dioxide gas directly from the air using solar energy via photosynthesis to break the carbon oxygen bonds and weave the carbon atoms into complex sugars and structural cellulose. Herbivores eat the plants. Carnivores eat the herbivores and step by step carbon moves through the food chain becoming part of muscles, bones, fat and DNA. Even we are part of that cycle. The human body is about 18% carbon by mass, which means every person is in a very real sense a walking collection of carbon atoms. And this is again a great way of naming a person you don't like. But not all carbon quickly returns to the air. When plants and animals die in places with little or no oxygen, like ancient swamps or deep ocean floors, their remains do not fully rot away. Instead, they get buried. Over millions of years, layer after layer of mud and rock presses down on this dead material. Heat and pressure slowly change it, squeezing out much of the hydrogen and oxygen and leaving behind a material that is richer and richer in carbon. This is how ancient life was transformed into pete, ligignet, coal, oil, and other fossil fuels. Now much of this happened during the Carboniferous period, a time when enormous swamp forests covered parts of the earth and huge amounts of plant material became buried. Now in a way these deposits are like earth's underground batteries, ancient sunlight captured by plants stored as carbon and later released by humans to power steam engines, factories, and the industrial world.

[00:22:05]Yeah, humanity's mastery over carbon is most evident in the highly sophisticated ways the element is currently extracted, processed, and engineered. The transformation of raw carbon into high techch industrial materials is a triumph of modern chemical engineering, operating on the exact principles of thermodynamics and physical chemistry previously described. Now, for centuries, diamonds could only be found by mining deep into the earth. It was difficult, expensive, and often damaging to the environment. But in December 1954, a scientist at the General Electric Laboratory in New York did something remarkable. They created the first true lab grown diamond. For the first time, humans had copied one of Earth's most extreme geological processes. Today, synthetic diamonds are made in two main ways. Both produce real diamonds. They are not fake glass or imitation stones. They are made of carbon atoms arranged in the same crystal structure as mine diamonds which means they can be physically chemically and optically identical. Now the first method is called high pressure high temperature or HPHD. This is the older method and it is basically an artificial version of the conditions deep inside the earth. Now a tiny diamond seed is placed inside a small capsule together with very pure carbon usually graphite powder and a metal catalyst made from metals like iron, nickel or cobalt. Now that capsule is then placed inside a huge mechanical press. It is squeezed under extreme pressure and heated to more than 1500° C or 2732° F. Now under these conditions the metal melts and dissolves. The graphite, the diamond seed is kept slightly cooler than the surrounding material. So, the dissolved carbon atoms move toward it and begin to attach themselves. Atom by atom, the diamond grows. Over several weeks, the tiny seed becomes a larger diamond crystal. Now, this method works very well, especially for industrial diamonds used in cutting and grinding tools. But because metal is used in the process, HPHT diamonds can sometimes contain tiny metallic inclusions trapped inside the stone. Now the second method is called chemical vapor deposition or CVD. Now instead of using crushing pressure, CVD is much more precise. It grows diamond almost one atomic layer at a time. Inside a vacuum chamber, a thin diamond seed plate is exposed to carbonri gas, usually methane mixed with hydrogen. Then using powerful microwaves or lasers, the gas is heated to around 800 to,200 degrees C or 1472 to 2192° F until it becomes a glowing plasma. Now this plasma breaks the methane molecules apart, freeing individual carbon atoms.

[00:25:00]Those carbon atoms then settle on the cooler diamond seat below. Like an atomic snowstorm, layer by layer, they build up the crystal structure of diamond. Now, because CVD does not need a liquid metal catalyst, it can produce extremely pure diamonds without metallic inclusions. These high purity diamonds are useful not only for jewelry, but also for advanced optics, electronics, semiconductors, and scientific instruments. So whether it is made by brute force in an HPHT press or grown layer by layer in a CVD chamber, the result is the same astonishing material.

[00:25:37]carbon arranged into one of the hardest and most beautiful structures on Earth.

[00:25:42]Now, carbon fiber is another incredible example of carbon engineering. It is often described as being several times stronger than steel, much stiffer and yet far lighter. Now, that's why it is used in aircraft, racing cars, bicycles, rockets, sports equipments, and high performance engineering. But the way we make it is surprisingly strange. To make carbon fiber, we start with a plastic-like material and then heat it so carefully that almost everything except the carbon is driven away. In a sense, we are destroying the original material until only a thin skeleton of carbon remains. Now, most commercial carbon fiber begins as a synthetic polymer called polyacry nitril or PAN.

[00:26:24]This material is first spun into thousands of extremely thin threads, each thinner than a human hair. Now the first step is called stabilization. The PAN fibers are pulled through an oven filled with air and heated to around 200 to 300° C. During this step, oxygen reacts with the polymer chains and the long flexible molecules begin to link together forming a much more stable structure. This is important because without this step, the fibers would simply melt or burn during the next stage. Now the next step is called carbonization. Now, the fibers are heated much more intensely to anywhere from 1,000° C to 3,000° C or 1,832° F to 5432° F. But this time, there is no oxygen.

[00:27:13]The furnace is filled with an inert gas such as nitrogen or argan. Now, because there is no oxygen, the fibers cannot catch fire. Instead, the heat tears away most of the non-carbon atoms such as hydrogen, nitrogen, and oxygen. These leave as gases while the remaining carbon atoms begin to rearrange themselves. The fiber loses a large part of its original weight. But what remains is far stronger. Inside the fiber, the carbon atoms line up into tiny graphite-ike sheets. Stretching along the length of the thread. This alignment is the secret to carbon fibers strength.

[00:27:49]It is not just carbon. It is carbon arranged in the right direction. The final step is surface treatment and sizing. Fresh carbon fibers are strong, but their surface is too smooth and chemically inactive. Now, that makes it difficult for them to bond properly with the resins and epoxies used to turn them into finished parts. So, the service is lightly treated often in a electrochemical bath. This roughens the fibers on a microscopic scale and adds chemical groups that help them stick to resin. Now, finally, the fibers are coated with a thin protective layer called sizing. This helps protect the delicate filaments, makes them easier to handle, and prevents them from breaking as they are wounded to spools or woven into fabric. So, carbon fiber begins as a plastic thread, is heated until much of it is driven away, and ends as one of the strongest lightweight materials we know. Now when carbon is required for heavy industrial filtration, it is transformed into activated carbon. A material defined not by its strength or structure, but by its microscopic emptiness. This is again a perfect way to describe somebody's brain. Activated carbon is one of the strangest and most useful forms of carbon. From the outside, it may look like a black powder or small black pellets, but inside it is full of tiny pores, tunnels, and cavities. A single gram of high quality activated carbon can have an enormous internal surface area, sometimes reaching thousands of square meters.

[00:29:20]Now, that means that a tiny amount can expose a surface area comparable to a large part of a football field. This hidden makes activated carbon act like a molecular sponge, but it does not work by soaking things up like a normal sponge. Instead, it traps molecules on its surface through a process called absorption. Now that is why activated carbon is used to clean water, filter air, remove odors, purify chemicals, and trap many organic compounds. The process begins with carbonrich materials such as wood, coal, pete, or coconut shells.

[00:29:53]This material is heated with little or no oxygen, so it does not simply burn away. Instead, many of the volatile compounds are driven off, leaving behind a dense carbonrich material called char.

[00:30:06]But char by itself is not yet activated carbon. To make it useful, its internal pores have to be opened up. Now there are two main ways to do this. The first is physical activation, often using steam. In this method, the char is heated up to around 800 to,00° while superheated steam or carbon dioxide passes through it. The steam reacts with the carbon and slowly eats away at it from the inside. Now you can think of this like a microscopic carving process. Tiny tunnels are opened, widened and connected creating a huge network of extremely small pores. Now this type of activated carbon is strong and often used for cleaning gases such as in air filters, industrial scrubbers, ventilation systems and odor control.

[00:30:55]Now the second method is chemical activation. And here the raw material, often something like wood, sawdust, is treated with a chemical such as phosphoric acid or zinc chloride before it is heated. These chemicals help hold the structure open while the material is being turned into carbon. Because of this, chemical activation can happen at lower temperatures, usually around 400 to 700° C. After heating, the chemical is washed out and often recycled. What remains is a highly porous carbon material with many larger pores. Now those larger pores are especially useful for trapping bigger molecules which makes chemically activated carbon very valuable for liquid filtration. It is used in water purification, food and drink processing and even medical and pharmaceutical applications. Now, synthetic diamonds and carbon fiber may sound more futuristic, but one of carbon's most important industrial forms is far less glamorous. Carbon black.

[00:31:57]Carbon black is a fine black powder used in huge quantities around the world. It strengthens rubber tires, gives printer ink its deep black color, and helps protect plastics from ultraviolet light.

[00:32:10]Most of it is made using the oil furnace process. Now, inside a heavily insulated reactor, natural gas is first burned with air to create a violent stream of hot combustion gases. Temperatures can reach 1,200 to,900° C or 2192 to 3,452° F. Into this extreme heat, manufacturers spray a fine mist of heavy hydrocarbon oil. But because most of the oxygen has already been used up by the burner, the oil does not simply catch fire. Instead, it breaks apart in the heat. This process is called paralysis.

[00:32:50]The hydrocarbon molecules crack open, release tiny particles of almost pure carbon. These particles crash into each other and fuse into branched grapelike clusters. The size and shape of these clusters are extremely important because they decide how well the carbon black will perform in rubber plastics or ink.

[00:33:11]Now the whole reaction lasts only milliseconds. Then it is suddenly stopped by spraying in water dropping the temperatures to around 500° C or 932° F. This freezes the carbon black into its final structure before it can burn further or break down. Finally, the fluffy black powder is filtered from the exhaust gases, turned into easier to handle pellets, and shipped to factories around the world. Now, one of carbon's most civilization changing roles is found in a material where carbon is technically an impurity, steel. Pure iron may sound strong, but on its own, it's actually quite soft and bendable.

[00:33:53]Its atoms are arranged in neat crystal layers and under stress those layers can slide past each other. Carbon changes that a carbon atom is much smaller than an iron atom. So it does not replace iron in the crystal. Instead, it squeezes into the tiny gaps between the iron atoms. And that small change makes a huge difference. Now these trapped carbon atoms get in the way of the iron layers as they try to move. In simple terms, they make the metal harder and stronger by stopping the atoms from sliding so easily. Steel making depends heavily on temperature. At room temperature, iron has a crystal structure called ferite, which has very little room for carbon. But when iron is heated above 912° C or 1674° F, its structure changes into oanite.

[00:34:46]This hotter form of iron has more space between the atoms, allowing much more carbon to dissolve into the metal. Now, the real magic happens when steel cools.

[00:34:56]If it cools slowly, the iron atoms have time to rearrange, and some of the carbon is pushed out, forming hard carbonri compounds such as cementite or Fe3C. But if the hot steel is suddenly cooled in water or oil in a process called quenching, everything happens too fast. The carbon atoms cannot escape.

[00:35:17]They become trapped inside the iron lettuce forcing it into a strained distorted structure called martinsite.

[00:35:24]Now you can imagine it like gravel jammed between sliding paving stones.

[00:35:28]The stones want to move but the gravel locks them in place. Now this is what carbon does inside steel. It blocks movement at an atomic level making the metal much harder and stronger. By adjusting the amount of carbon, usually less than 2%, and carefully controlling how the steel is heated and cooled, metallergists can create completely different materials, flexible wires, strong I-beams, sharp blades, armor, and the steel skeletons of modern cities.

[00:35:56]Now, beyond diamond, steel, and carbon fiber, carbon has another remarkable use. It lets us measure ancient time.

[00:36:03]Most carbon on Earth is carbon 12, a stable form of an element. A smaller amount is carbon 13. But a tiny fraction exist as carbon 14, a radioactive isotope. Carbon 14 is made high in the atmosphere. Cosmic rays from space slam into air molecules and create free neutrons. When one of these neutrons hits a nitrogen 14 atom, it knocks out a proton. Now, that changes the nitrogen atom into radioactive carbon 14. This new carbon 14 quickly combines with oxygen to form radioactive carbon dioxide. From there, it mixes into the atmosphere and enters the living world.

[00:36:42]Plants absorb it during photosynthesis.

[00:36:45]Animals eat plants, other animals eat those animals. And in this way, carbon 14 becomes part of almost every living thing. Now, as long as an organism is alive, it keeps exchanging carbon with the environment. It breathes, it eats, grows, and replaces old carbon with new carbon. So the ratio of carbon 14 to ordinary carbon inside its body stays roughly in balance with the atmosphere.

[00:37:11]But the moment it dies, that exchange stops. No new carbon enters the body.

[00:37:16]And from that point on, the carbon 14 inside slowly begins to decay. Carbon 14 is unstable. Over time, it gives off beta radiation and turns back into nitrogen 14. This decay happens at a steady, predictable rate. The half-life of carbon 14 is about 5,730 years. That means that after 5,730 years, half of the original carbon 14 in a sample has decayed. So if archaeologists find a piece of ancient wood, bone, cloth or charcoal, they can measure how much carbon 14 is left and estimate when the organism has died. Now this method is called carbon dating. It was developed in the 1940s by Willard Libby, who later won the Nobel Prize for it. The technique completely changed archaeology because it gave scientists a way to date ancient objects directly instead of only comparing them to other finds. Now, radiocarbon dating helped map the end of the last ice age, the spread of early farming, and the rise of ancient civilizations. But it does have limits after about 50,000 years. So little carbon 14 remains that the signal becomes very difficult to measure. And because humans have burned huge amounts of ancient fossil fuels, which contain almost no carbon 14, the modern carbon balance in the atmosphere has been disturbed. This makes some more recent samples harder to date accurately. Now, even with those limits, radiocarbon dating remains one of the most powerful tools in science. By watching one rare form of carbon slowly disappear, we can read the timeline of life, death, and human history. Now, we decided to skip over the usual stuff about carbon, like coal plants and how coal was used in the industrial revolution, but we thought these applications and stories were far more interesting. And that brings us to the chemistry question of the week. Why does dry ice appear to smoke? A. Carbon dioxide burns in air. B. Solid CO2 evaporates into water vapor. C. Solid CO2 causes water vapor in the air to condense into tiny droplets. D. Dry ice releases oxygen. If you want to know the answer, click on the right side of the screen in the quiz. And that brings us to the viewers question of the week. And this week it's from Chem Zero Poet. What if Oenesson isn't in group 18 at all, but instead forms the start of a new series of elements much like the lenonides and actides? I mean the transition metal starts in period 4 with the outer electrons in 3d orbitals. The lenonides starts in period 5 with outer electrons in the 4F orbitals. Would it be so inconceivable that the next outlier block of elements could start in period 7 with outer electrons in orbitals beyond 5, 6, and 7p. Now it is not inconceivable at all. In fact, you are poking at one of the most fascinating debates in modern theoretical chemistry. While Z is 118 officially sits at the bottom of group 18, it is highly likely that it behaves absolutely nothing like a noble gas.

[00:40:40]Relativistic effects at that extreme atomic mass heavily disrupt the standard orbital filling rules we teach in our textbooks. However, based on quantum mechanical calculations, the specific outlier block or new series you are describing, the G block is predicted to start just a couple of steps further down the road in period 8. Now, before looking at the next block, it is worth seeing just how weird Ogganesson already is. Now, because it's massive nucleus holds 180 protons, the innermost electrons are pulled inward at near light speeds. This causes a massive cascade of quantum disruptions. The electron gas, the 7p veence electrons in OG experience such an intense spin orbit splitting that their energy levels blur together instead of neat distinct electron shells. Theoretical models show that outer electron cloud smears out into a nearly uniform structureless blob of charge that we would call a firmy gas. Not a gas, not noble. Because of this blur, ogganesson is highly polarizable. It is predicted to be a semiconductor solid at room temperature and is actually expected to be quite reactive, readily forming compounds like OGF4. Now, the standard made long rule, the order we expect orbitals to fill, completely collapses after element 118.

[00:42:08]If we move into period 8, elements 119 and 120 will fill the 8s orbital. Right after that at element 121, your predicted outlier block officially begins. This is the start of the super actctonides where the theoretical pristine 5g orbitals finally begin to fill. Now Glinty Seabborg created a extended periodic table showing this hypothetical GB block and it shows elements 121 to 156. Now it also doesn't really look like a lengthide. When the lenthnites fill the 4F block, those 4F orbitals are buried deep inside the electron cloud shielded by outer electrons. This is why lenthnites all behave so similar to one another. Now the 5g block and the accompanying 6F and 7d orbitals filling simultaneously will not have that luxury. Relativistic contraction forces all these outer subshells to sit at incredibly similar energy levels. Instead of a neat transition where one orbital fills element by element, elements 121 through about 156, will feature a chaotic soup of competing veence electrons. Element 124, a hypothetical heavyweight, for instance, might use 5g, 6f, and 7d and 8p electrons all at the same time to form bonds. So while itself is the chaotic grand finale of the standard P block, it acts as the gateway to exactly what you envisioned, a massive 32 element transition series where traditional groups and columns completely lose their meaning. So I hope this answer made a little bit of sense.

[00:44:02]Now if you have a question for us that you want answered, put it in the comments and maybe we will discuss your question in the upcoming week. Now we would like to thank the members and subscribers that support our channel.

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