neodymium

neodymium (Nd), chemical element, a rare-earth metal of the lanthanide series of the periodic table.

Neodymium is a ductile and malleable silvery white metal. It oxidizes readily in air to form an oxide, Nd₂O₃, which easily spalls, exposing the metal to further oxidation. The metal must be stored sealed in a plastic covering or kept in vacuum or in an inert atmosphere. It reacts gradually with mineral acids—except hydrofluoric acid (HF), in which it forms a protective layer of trifluoride, NdF₃. Neodymium is strongly paramagnetic and orders antiferromagnetically at 7.5 and 19.9 K (−265.7 and −253.3 °C, or −446.2 and −423.9 °F) with spontaneous magnetic moments developing separately on different independent sites, hexagonal and cubic, respectively.

Austrian chemist Carl Auer von Welsbach discovered neodymium in 1885 by separating ammonium didymium nitrate prepared from didymia (a mixture of rare-earth oxides) into a neodymium fraction and a praseodymium fraction by repeated crystallization. Of the rare earths, only yttrium, lanthanum, and cerium are more plentiful than neodymium. In the igneous rocks of Earth’s crust, it is more than twice as abundant as lead and about half as plentiful as copper.

Natural neodymium is a mixture of seven different isotopes. Five of them are stable—neodymium-142 (27.13 percent), neodymium-146 (17.19 percent), neodymium-143 (12.18 percent), neodymium-145 (8.30 percent), and neodymium-148 (5.76 percent)—and two are radioactive, neodymium-144 (23.80 percent) and neodymium-150 (5.64 percent). A total of 31 radioactive isotopes of neodymium (excluding nuclear isomers) have been characterized, ranging in mass from 124 to 161 and in half-life from 0.65 second (neodymium-125) to 7.9 × 10¹⁸ years (neodymium-150).

Neodymium occurs in the minerals monazite and bastnasite and is a product of nuclear fission. Liquid-liquid separation or ion-exchange techniques are employed for separation and purification of neodymium. The metal itself is prepared by electrolysis of the fused halides or by metallothermic reduction of the fluoride with calcium. Two allotropes (structural forms) of neodymium exist: the α-phase is double close-packed hexagonal with a = 3.6582 Å and c = 11.7966 Å at room temperature. The β-phase is body-centred cubic with a = 4.13 Å at 883 °C (1,621 °F).

The major application of neodymium is in high-strength permanent magnets based on Nd₂Fe₁₄B that are used in high-performance electric motors and generators, as well as in spindle magnets for computer hard drives and wind turbines. The metal is used in the electronics industry, in the manufacture of steel, and as a component in a number of ferrous and nonferrous alloys, among them misch metal (15 percent neodymium), used for lighter flints. The metal itself—and as an alloy with another lanthanide, erbium—has been employed as a regenerator in low-temperature cryocooler applications to provide cooling down to 4.2 K (−269 °C, or −452 °F). Its compounds are used in the ceramics industry for glazes and to colour glass in various shades from pink to purple. Neodymium-stabilized yttrium aluminum garnet (YAG) is a component of many modern lasers, and neodymium glasses are used in fibre optics. A mixture of neodymium and praseodymium absorbs light in the region of the harmful sodium-D spectral lines and therefore is used in the glass of welders’ and glassblowers’ goggles.

The element in its compounds such as the oxide Nd₂O₃ and the hydroxide Nd(OH)₃ is nearly always in the +3 oxidation state; the Nd³⁺ ion is stable in water. Only a few compounds of neodymium in the +2 state have been prepared, such as the diiodide NdI₂ and the dichloride NdCl₂; the Nd²⁺ ion is unstable in aqueous solution.