Tin (Sn) is a ductile and lightweight silver-white metal. It is mainly used as a non-toxic coating that protects the product from corrosion. It is used both in pure form and in alloy compositions, including precision. In the periodic table, D. AND. Mendeleev is number 50.
The Latin name for tin is stannum, which means “strong, persistent”. Initially, this was the name for an alloy of lead and silver, later for tin-based alloys, and only by the 4th century AD — the Sn element itself.
Today it is impossible to say exactly when tin was found. It was first mentioned in the 4th millennium BC. At that time, this metal was inaccessible and very expensive, so products made from it were quite rare.
Tin began to become popular only by the end of the 3rd millennium BC during the Bronze Age. As one of the components of tin bronze (along with copper), it became a “strategic metal” and was used in many areas: from making jewelry and tableware to making armor and weapons. Scientists believe that bronze, an alloy of tin and copper, was the first artificial metal that mankind has learned to smelt.
Despite the rich history of the use of tin, scientists were able to obtain pure metal only in the 12th-13th centuries — before that, the metal used had always contained some lead. The first mention of pure tin is found in the works of Roger Bacon (1214-1292), an English philosopher and naturalist.
After people learned how to remove impurities from tin, pure metal began to be used to make jewelry and kitchen utensils. Unfortunately, as soon as the tin product spent a little time in the cold, a strange “disease” struck it: gray spots appeared on the surface, which gradually increased, and then the metal seemed to dissolve in these places. Medieval scholars called this phenomenon the “tin plague”.
The cause of the “tin plague” was found only at the beginning of the 20th century, after examining the crystal lattices of “contaminated” and “pure” metal using X-rays. It turned out that at t below 13.2°C, stannum from the β-modification (white tin) goes into the α-modification (gray tin), which leads to the dispersion of the solid metal into powder.
It is believed that the “tin plague” was one of the reasons for the death of polar explorers from the Terra Nova expedition in March 1912. The British, led by Robert Scott, moved to the South Pole, leaving “caches” of food and fuel on their way, which they were going to use on the way back. When they returned to the parking lots, they found empty tanks. At that time, seams were still soldered with pure tin, which caused canisters to leak at low temperatures.
Napoleon Bonaparte's defeat in Russia is also partly attributed to the “tin plague”. According to legend, the belt buckles and buttons on the uniforms of soldiers and officers were made of tin, which quickly crumbled under the conditions of Russian frosts, which made further combat operations difficult.
There is no “cure” for the “tin plague” yet, as, in general, there is no need for it — it is much easier to use tin not in its pure form, but as part of alloys, such as:
Modern microelectronics has also found practical use for the “tin plague”. To etch chips, you need deep ultraviolet light (UV rays with a wavelength of 13.5 nm), and to produce it, you need the finest optics, which quickly fade during operation due to tin condensation. Cleaning glasses with gray tin allows you to remove the smallest particles of metal from their surface without leaving the slightest scratches on the lenses.
