Radium

Radium: geological information

Radium is found naturally in uranium ores such as pitchblende (mostly UO₂). One tonne of pitchblende might yield about 0.15 g of radium. Ores containing radium are found in Zaire, Australia, Canada, and USA (New Mexico, Utah, and in small amounts in carnotite sands from Colorado). Recovery is costly. Some estimates suggest that every square kilometre of soil to a depth of a 40 cm contains about 1 g of radium.

Abundances of radium in various environments

In this table of abundances, values are given in units of ppb (parts per billion; 1 billion = 10⁹), both in terms of weight and in terms of numbers of atoms. Values for abundances are difficult to determine with certainty, so all values should be treated with some caution, especially so for the less common elements. Local concentrations of any element can vary from those given here an orders of magnitude or so and values in various literature sources for less common elements do seem to vary considerably.

The chart below shows the log of the abundance (on a parts per billion scale) of the elements by atom number in our sun. Notice the "sawtooth" effect where elements with even atomic numbers tend to be more strongly represented than those with odd atomic numbers. This shows up best using the "Bar chart" option on the chart.

Log abundance (by atom numbers) in our sun

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