Krypton, discovery properties

Since the discovery of the first noble gas compound, Xe PtF (Bartlett, 1962), a number of compounds of krypton, xenon, and radon have been prepared. Xenon has been shown to have a very rich chemistry, encompassing simple fluorides, XeF2> XeF, and XeF oxides, XeO and XeO oxyf luorides, XeOF2> XeOF, and Xe02 2 perxenates perchlorates fluorosulfates and many adducts with Lewis acids and bases (Bartlett and Sladky, 1973). Krypton compounds are less stable than xenon compounds, hence only about a dozen have been prepared KrF and derivatives of KrF2> such as KrF+SbF, KrF+VF, and KrF+Ta2F11. The chemistry of radon has been studied by radioactive tracer methods, since there are no stable isotopes of this element, and it has been deduced that radon also forms a difluoride and several complex salts. In this paper, some of the methods of preparation and properties of radon compounds are described. For further information concerning the chemistry, the reader is referred to a recent review (Stein, 1983). 

After helium and argon had been discovered the existence of neon, krypton, xenon, and radon was clearly indicated by the periodic law, and the search for these elements in air led to the discovery of the first three of them radon was then discovered during the investigation of the properties of radium and other radioactive substances. While studying the relation between atomic structure and the periodic law Niels Bohr pointed out that element 72 would be expected to be similar in its properties to zirconium. G. von Hevesy and D. Coster were led by this observation to examine ores of zirconium and to discover the missing element which they named hafnium. 

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