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rhodium

rhodium

3 9.9
A rare hard white metal used to make jewellery shiny and to speed chemical reactions
  • noun
  • /ˈroʊdiəm/
  • Specialized
translation icon : rhodio
  • Rhodium is often associated with platinum, so if you want to find rhodium, find platinum.
  • rhodium and palladium
  • rhodium and ruthenium
  • platinum and rhodium

Examples

  • Automakers, to ensure a continued supply of rhodium, use a platinum, palladium, rhodium system in the converters.

    Blog text (34)
  • Platinum is trading at $1,699.00/oz, palladium at $685.50/oz, and rhodium at $1,050/oz.

    Blog text (3)
  • The interesting thing about the rhodium price curve is its spikiness.

    Blog text (34)
  • We've never given a price forecast for rhodium; I don't think this is a good time to start.

    Blog text (34)
  • Since 1990, when rhodium was $7,000, they've been very careful about the amounts they use.

    Blog text (34)
  • Yaru bent to examine the small piles of rhodium, palladium, and ruthenium with a hard, skeptical eye.

    Fiction book (1999)
  • The X-ray source was an Oxford Instruments 100 W Neptune X-ray tube with a rhodium (Rh) target.

    Academic text (2018)
  • The new alloy is corrugated and fashioned into the honeycombed substrate foils upon which platinum, rhodium, or palladium are deposited to transform car emissions.

    Academic text (1999)
  • The rhodium collects electrons, two at a time, to perform the reaction.

  • It's coated in rhodium to make it shine instead of the regular polishing and finishing.

Synonyms

Rh
vsrhodium
  • Specialized
9.9

A hard silvery-white metal in the platinum group used in alloys and to help chemical reactions

is the full element name rather than the symbol
atomic number 45
vsrhodium
  • Specialized
7.7

A hard silver-white metal found with platinum used to coat jewellery and help chemical reactions

is the name word rather than the numeric identifier

Surface Forms

rhodium singular
rhodiums plural

Morphology

rhodium = rhod + ium

The suffix '-ium' signals an element/metal (helpful to learners), but the combining form 'rhod-' is not a standalone English word and does not transparently convey the meaning 'metal' to average learners.

Etymology

Rhodium comes from the Greek root rhod- meaning 'rose', because early scientists found some rose-coloured chemicals of the metal, so you can remember the name by thinking of a little rose. That's why the element still has the name rhodium today, even though the metal itself is shiny and silver.