Still arguing about the periodic table 150 years later

Mendeleev used the periodicity of the chemical elements to organise a chart that we now refer to quite obviously as the Periodic Table of the Chemical Elements. He did it 150 years ago. This anniversary year chemists are celebrating his “invention”. Trouble is lots of them don’t think the classic PT is the way we should display the chemical elements and have been arguing the point for years and years.

Periodic debate in Chemistry Views

And, just to prove the point about how much they want to argue this topic, my article entitled “Periodic Debate” which featured in Chemistry Views magazine back in June 2011 has been read by more than 122000 people!

The arguments made by my interviewees in that piece are all still active as far as I know, they each have a view about how the Periodic Table should be arranged, the exact order of the elements and even whether it really ought to be a three-dimensional spiral array rather than a flat grid.

You can still read the article – Periodic Debate – here.