Write the electronic
configuration of Holmium (z = 67). What is its stable oxidation state
Answers
Answer:
Holmium is a moderately hard, silvery white metal that is relatively stable in air. It readily reacts with diluted acids but does not react with either diluted or concentrated hydrofluoric acid (HF), due to formation of a protective surface layer of HoF3. Holmium is a very strong paramagnet above 133 K (−140 °C, or −220 °F). At that temperature the metal orders antiferromagnetically, forming a basal plane spiral structure. At 19 K (−254 °C, or −425 °F) the magnetic moments tilt along the c-axis lifting out of the basal plane by some 10°, forming a conical ferrimagnetic structure.
Holmium was discovered spectroscopically (1878) by Swiss chemists Jacques-Louis Soret and Marc Delafontaine and independently (1879) by Swedish chemist Per Teodor Cleve, who separated it chemically from erbium and thulium. Cleve named the element for his native city of Stockholm, its Latinized name being Holmia. Holmium occurs associated with other rare earths in laterite clays and in the minerals xenotime, euxenite, and many others; it also occurs in the products of nuclear fission.