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AMERICIUM COMPLEX
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Introduction
Americium complex is a freely occurring element on the earth's structure with an atomic number
of 95. The element is very light with an atomic mass of approximately 243 g/mol hence allows
reacting with air quickly. Also, it has a density, 13. 67 g/cm3, which is relatively small, comparing
it with other denser metals in the periodic table. The uniqueness of this element is the highness of
melting and melting point, which differs so much from other elements in the periodic table. It melts
at 994oC and boils at 2607oC. (White et al., 2018). The element exists in the form of isotopes, and
it records to have eight known isotopes. It has several energy orbitals and requires relatively high
energy to remove each energy level, and such its ionization energy is 578 KJ/mol. It has an
electronic shell of 5f, which manages its electromagnetic behavior, and the molecules within the
elements share a strong bond structure.

Figure 1: americium complex structure

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Americium is a silvery-white metal usually synthetic in nature. The metal tarnishes in the air but
resistant in alkalis. Americium metal is opaquer than lead. Some of the americium components are
generally colored, such as chloride, which is pink in color (Aspinall, 2018). The americium
accesses the oxidation states in both alkaline and acidic solutions. The most mutual oxidation
solution, which is in the aqueous state, is the trivalent solution of americium.
The solute is present in americium metal ions. Hexavalent and pentavalent americium occurs as
linear where the americium ions make complexes using several anions. The ligands of inorganic
monovalent follow the same sequence, which has complex stability. The trivalent solution of
americium forms phosphate, oxalate, iodate, and fluoride compounds, which are insoluble
(Richards,2018). It also forms complexes of hydroxides in liquid solutions, which are similar to
actinide components. The complexes dissolve at a low rate; hence most of the technologies of
partitioning that spent nuclear fuel use high acidic situations.
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Americium is found naturally from minerals of uranium, although in trace amount (Kragh, 2018).
Neutron bombardment of reactors is the core source of americium element, hence it is essential to
separate americium solutions from complex compounds consisting curium. Also, the trivalent
solution of americium should also be separated from curium as well as separating americium of
high oxidation from the curium (Lewis et al., 2018). Separating the curium from americium is a
bit complex due to the usage of the same chemical separation methods. When the separations
require that aqueous technique of separation, it typically uses the acidic solutes, since the curium
and americium seem to hydrolyze hence forming hydroxides which are soluble in alkaline
environs. The aqueous technique of separating curium from americium involves two categories:

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separating the trivalent solution of americium from a compound containing curium, and separating
the americium element with higher oxidation from compounds containing curium.
The availability of partitioning technologies facilitates the production of nuclear fuels and allows
the advancement of atomic cycles. Nuclear fuels require americium elements that undergo
radioactive decomposition to release large amounts of heat energy (Vigier et al.,2018). Americium
and curium are scarce elements and occurs in trivalent states in acidic solutions, and their ions
have similar radii sizes. The need for separating these elements leads to the development of
extraction systems. The separation of curium and americium elements from a complex compound
is sometimes expensive and time-consuming. The complexity of isolation is due to the existence
of similarities in chemical composition between the elements forming the mixture (Poeplau, et
al.,2018). After the removal of americium from waste products, the material turns less risky, thus,
improving prediction accuracy in ecological repositories.
The separation process of curium from americium attains only 50% and 70% recovery resulting
from the elimination of curium.

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Figure 2: pre-separation of mixtures
From the figure above, the system of separation recovers 98% of curium and 97% of americium.
During the separation, some amounts of gas evolve from bismuthate solution reaction. However,
this phenomenon does not affect the separation process. After a successful separation of americium
from the other components, then the metal has some application and importance to human life.
Americium is crucial to making detectors of smoke, and it is also an essential source of gamma
rays that are portable to assist in the creation of flat glasses (Williams, 2018). Nevertheless, this
isotope is enormously expensive to yield in usable amounts.
Exposing human beings to americium elements risks them from acquiring several ailments. The
exposition occurs through a high concentration of americium in foods, through breathing—also,
skin contact due to the release of americium during nuclear...