Thorium oxides

is a white solid that adopts the fluorite structure (as do the MO2 phases of the other actinides). When heated it gives off a rather bluish light if about 1% cerium is added, the light is both whiter and more intense so that the mixture came to be used in making incandescent gas mantles, widely used for lighting until comparatively recently. 

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Several methods are available for producing thorium metal it can be obtained by reducing thorium oxide with calcium, by electrolysis of anhydrous thorium chloride in a fused mixture of sodium and potassium chlorides, by calcium reduction of thorium tetrachloride mixed with... 

This is a way to do this procedure without having to use one of those crazy tube furnaces stuffed with thorium oxide or manganous oxide catalyst [21]. The key here is to use an excess of acetic anhydride. Using even more than the amount specified will insure that the reaction proceeds in the right direction and the bad side reaction formation of dibenzylketone will be minimalized (don t ask). 18g piperonylic acid or 13.6g phenylacetic acid, 50mL acetic anhydride and 50mU pyridine are refluxed for 6 hours and the solvent removed by vacuum distillation. The remaining residue is taken up in benzene or ether, washed with 10% NaOH solution (discard the water layer), and vacuum distilled to get 8g P2P (56%). 

The homogeneous reactor experiment-2 (HRE-2) was tested as a power-breeder in the late 1950s. The core contained highly enriched uranyl sulfate in heavy water and the reflector contained a slurry of thorium oxide [1314-20-1J, Th02, in D2O. The reactor thus produced fissile uranium-233 by absorption of neutrons in thorium-232 [7440-29-1J, the essentially stable single isotope of thorium. Local deposits of uranium caused reactivity excursions and intense sources of heat that melted holes in the container (18), and the project was terrninated. 

Coordination Complexes. The coordination and organometaHic chemistry of thorium is dominated by the extremely stable tetravalent ion. Except in a few cases where large and stericaHy demanding ligands are used, lower thorium oxidation states are generally unstable. An example is the isolation of a molecular Th(III) complex [107040-62-0] Th[Tj-C H2(Si(CH2)3)2]3 (25). Reports (26) on the synthesis of soluble Th(II) complexes, such as... 

For the production of lamp-filament wire, aluminum, potassium, and siHcon dopants are added to the blue oxide. Some dopants are trapped in the tungsten particles upon reduction. Excess dopants are then removed by washing the powder in hydroflouric acid. Eor welding electrodes and some other appHcations, thorium nitrate is added to the blue oxide. After reduction, the thorium is present as a finely dispersed thorium oxide. 

Bromine reacts with some metal oxides, eg, thorium oxide, at high temperatures in the presence of reducing agents to form bromides (18). Certain nonhydrated metal haUdes can be formed by precipitation. These include AgBr, CuBr, AuBr, HBr, PbBr2, PtBr2, and Hg2Br2 (19). 

The most important minerals of the lanthanide elements are monazite (phosphates of La, Ce, Pr, Nd and Sm, as well as thorium oxide) plus cerite and gadolinite (silicates of these elements). Separation is difficult because of the chemical similarity of the lanthanides. Fractional crystallization, complex formation, and selective adsorption and elution using an ion exchange resin (chromatography) are the most successful methods. 

Thorium oxide on activated carbon was prepared by absorption of thorium nitrate from its solution in anhydrous acetone on the activated carbon Supersorbon. The excess solution was decanted, the catalyst was dried at 80 °C, and the adsorbed thorium oxide was decomposed by excess 5% ammonium hydroxide solution. After repeated washing and decanta-nation with distilled water and acetone, the catalyst was dried at 180°C. It was then stabilized by heating to 360°C for 5 hr in a stream of nitrogen. The content of thorium oxide was 2.9% (wt.). The BET surface area was 870 m2/g. Prior to kinetic measurements, the catalyst was modified by passing over acetic acid vapors (100 g acid/1 g catalyst). 

Parallel ketonization of acetic acid and propionic acid was one of the transformations of this type studied in our Laboratory. Ryba6ek and Setinek (94) investigated the kinetics of these reactions in the gaseous phase at 316°C using thorium oxide on activated carbon (p. 27) as the catalyst. This model system allowed the study of each reaction separately as well as of the simultaneous conversion of both acids. 

None of the products or experimental preparations is currently in clinical use or under development. Thorium oxide was not excreted at all furthermore it proved to be toxic because of long-lived a-radiation [4]. Other agents were not pursued because they displayed various types of toxicity or were less well tolerated than the extracellular contrast agents. Except thorium dioxide, none of them resulted in reliable and satisfactory contrast or provided important diagnostic information which could not have been obtained with a similar quality by more recently established imaging methods. In spite of an everlasting... 

Liver, spleen, lymph nodes Thorium oxide Thonotrast Uptake by macrophages, RES Urich K. (1995) Successes and failures in the development of contrast media. Blackwell, Berlin... 

Carboxylic acids can be converted to symmetrical ketones by pyrolysis in the presence of thorium oxide. In a mixed reaction, formic acid and another acid heated... 

Reaction between formic acid, another acid, and thorium oxide... 

Nearly quantitative yields of acetonitrile can be obtained by passing mixtures of NH3 and acetylene over zircon at 400-500°C [225], over CviOy on Y-alumina at 360°C [226] or by passing mixtures of NH, acetylene and hydrogen at 400-420°C over a mixture of zinc and thorium oxides on silica [227] or at 300-450°C over zinc oxide or zinc sulfate or zinc chloride on silica [228, 229], In such reactions, the role of traces of water has often been questioned. However, acetonitrile could be obtained under rigorously anhydrous conditions, thus demonstrating the direct amination of acetylene with NH,. It was also reported that ethyUdeneimine can be obtained in up to 26% yield [225], However, in the Ught of more recent work [230, 231] the product was most probably 2,4,6-trimethyl-l,3,5-hexahydrotriazine. 

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