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NITROGEN
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Nitrogen is a chemical element which has the symbol N and atomic number 7 in the periodic table. Elemental nitrogen is a colorless, odorless, tasteless and mostly inert diatomic gas at standard conditions, constituting 78.08% percent of Earth's atmosphere. Nitrogen is a constituent element of all living tissues and amino acids. Many industrially important compounds, such as ammonia, nitric acid, and cyanides, contain nitrogen.
Notable characteristics of elemental nitrogen
Nitrogen is a non-metal, with an electronegativity of 3.0. It has five electrons in its outer shell and is therefore trivalent in most compounds. The triple bond in molecular nitrogen (N2) is one of the strongest in nature. The resulting difficulty of converting (N2) into other compounds, and the relative ease (and associated high energy release) of converting nitrogen compounds into elemental N2, have dominated the role of nitrogen in both nature and human economic activities.
Molecular nitrogen condenses at 77 K at atmospheric pressure and freezes at 63 K. Liquid nitrogen, a fluid resembling water, but with 81% of the density, is a common cryogen.
Occurrence
Nitrogen is the largest single component of the Earth's atmosphere (78.084% by volume, 75.5% by weight).
Nitrogen is created as part of the fusion processes in stars.
Compounds that contain this element have been observed by astronomers, and molecular nitrogen has been detected in interstellar space by David Knauth and coworkers using the Far Ultraviolet Spectroscopic Explorer. Molecular nitrogen is a major constituent of Titan's thick atmosphere, and occurs in trace amounts of other planetary atmospheres.
Nitrogen is present in all living tissues as proteins, nucleic acids and other molecules. It is a large component of animal waste (for example, guano), usually in the form of urea, uric acid, and compounds of these nitrogenous products.
Isotopes
There are two stable isotopes of nitrogen: 14N and 15N. By far the most common is 14N (99.634%), which is produced in the CNO cycle in stars and the remaining is 15N. Of the ten isotopes produced synthetically, 13N has a half life of nine minutes and the remaining isotopes have half lives on the order of seconds or less. Biologically-mediated reactions (e.g., assimilation, nitrification, and denitrification) strongly control nitrogen dynamics in the soil. These reactions almost always result in 15N enrichment of the substrate and depletion of the product.
The molecular nitrogen in Earth's atmosphere is 0.73% comprised of the isotopologue 14N15N and almost all the rest is 14N2.
Electromagnetic spectrum
Molecular nitrogen (14N2) is largely transparent to infrared and visible radiation because it is a homonuclear molecule and thus has no dipole moment to couple to electromagnetic radiation at these wavelengths. Significant absorption occurs at extreme ultraviolet wavelengths, beginning around 100 nanometers. This is associated with electronic transitions in the molecule to states in which charge is not distributed evenly between nitrogen atoms. Nitrogen absorption leads to significant absorption of ultraviolet radiation in the Earth's upper atmosphere as well as in the atmospheres of other planetary bodies. For similar reasons, pure molecular nitrogen lasers typically emit light in the far ultraviolet range.
Nitrogen also makes a contribution to visible air glow from the Earth's upper atmosphere, through electron impact excitation followed by emission. This visible blue air glow (seen in the polar aurora and in the re-entry glow of returning spacecraft) typically results not from molecular nitrogen, but rather from free nitrogen atoms combining with oxygen to form nitric oxide (NO).
History
Nitrogen (Latin nitrogenium, where nitrum (from Greek nitron) means "native soda", and genes means "forming") is formally considered to have been discovered by Daniel Rutherford in 1772, who called it noxious air or fixed air. That there was a fraction of air that did not support combustion was well known to the late 18th century chemist. Nitrogen was also studied at about the same time by Carl Wilhelm Scheele, Henry Cavendish, and Joseph Priestley, who referred to it as burnt air or phlogisticated air. Nitrogen gas was inert enough that Antoine Lavoisier referred to it as azote, from the Greek word αζωτος meaning "lifeless". Animals died in it, and it was the principal component of air in which animals had suffocated and flames had burned to extinction. This term has become the French word for "nitrogen" and later spread out to many other languages.
Compounds of nitrogen were known in the Middle Ages. The alchemists knew nitric acid as aqua fortis (strong water). The mixture of nitric and hydrochloric acids was known as aqua regia (royal water), celebrated for its ability to dissolve gold (the king of metals). The earliest industrial and agricultural applications of nitrogen compounds used it in the form of saltpeter (sodium- or potassium nitrate), notably in gunpowder, and much later, as fertilizer, and later still, as a chemical feedstock.
Modern applications
Nitrogen gas is acquired for industrial purposes by the fractional distillation of liquid air, or by mechanical means using gaseous air (i.e. pressurised reverse osmosis membrane or pressure swing adsorption). Commercial nitrogen is often a byproduct of air-processing for industrial concentration of oxygen for steelmaking and other purposes.
Molecular nitrogen (gas and liquid)
Nitrogen gas has a wide variety of applications, including serving as a more inert replacement for air where oxidation is undesirable;
Contrary to some claims that nitrogen will diffuse more rapidly through rubber tires than air (and oxygen), nitrogen molecules are less likely to escape from the inside of a tire compared to the traditional air mixture used. Air consists mostly of nitrogen and oxygen. Nitrogen molecules are larger than oxygen molecules and therefore, all else being equal, larger molecules diffuse through porous substances slower than smaller molecules.
A further example of its versatility is its use as a preferred alternative to carbon dioxide to pressurize kegs of some beers, particularly thicker stouts and Scottish and English ales, due to the smaller bubbles it produces, which make the dispensed beer smoother and headier. A modern application of a pressure sensitive nitrogen capsule known commonly as a "widget" now allows nitrogen charged beers to be packaged in cans and bottles.
Liquid nitrogen (liquid density at the triple point is 0.807 g/mL)is produced industrially in large quantities by fractional distillation of liquid air and is often referred to by the quasi-formula LN2 (but is more accurately written N2(l) ). It is a cryogenic fluid which is potentially capable of causing instant frostbite on contact with living tissue (see precautions). When appropriately insulated from ambient heat, liquid nitrogen serves as a compact and readily transported source of nitrogen gas without pressurization. Further, its ability to maintain temperatures far below the freezing point of water (it boils at 77 K, which equals -196 °C or -320 °F) makes it extremely useful in a wide range of applications as an open-cycle refrigerant, including;
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