Where Can I Buy Thorium-90 for a 90th Birthday Gift?

hello,

i'd like to buy a small amount of the element thorium to give to someone as a gift for his 90th birthday. ideally i'd like to buy 90g, but i suppose any amount is fine. I've found a couple of sites that sell thorium [american elements, nova elements], but they seem to be out of stock. i was hoping someone on these forums could share a link or two to other places where i might find it.

note - not looking for items that may contain thorium, like old lamp mantles. i'd like the actual element. something like the little vials displayed on this page would be perfect.

thanks.

There is no such thing as Thorium-90.

Pure thorium is not cheap. Think $50,000/90 g and it will take a lttle chemistry to get the pure element.

david007 said:

i'd like to buy a small amount of the element thorium to give to someone as a gift for his 90th birthday.

Maybe give him the whole Periodic Table instead -- much more fun at parties!


https://www.physicsforums.com/threads/where-to-buy-thorium-90.1015140/

david007 said:

Where to buy thorium-90 ?

hello,

i'd like to buy a small amount of the element thorium to give to someone as a gift for his 90th birthday. ideally i'd like to buy 90g, but i suppose any amount is fine. I've found a couple of sites that sell thorium [american elements, nova elements], but they seem to be out of stock. i was hoping someone on these forums could share a link or two to other places where i might find it.

note - not looking for items that may contain thorium, like old lamp mantles. i'd like the actual element. something like the little vials displayed on this page would be perfect.

thanks.

As Vanadium 50 indicated, we do not call thorium thorium-90. Usually the number in hyphenated designation is the atomic mass, A, of a particular isotope, e.g., Th-232 (14 billion year half-life), not the atomic number Z of the element, which for thorium Z=90.

American Elements is probably the one I would recommend, but possible Reade.
https://www.reade.com/products/thorium-metal-th

It would be best if encased in a sealed glass tube.

One might consider 90 mg or μg.

Why not find a stainless steel alloy with some magnesium?
Mg+Cr+Fe+Ni = 12+24+26+28 = 90

In 2019, prices of pure Thorium were at around 30 $/kg.

https://material-properties.org/thorium-properties-applications-price-production/

You could contact these guys:
https://www.americanelements.com/thorium-metal-7440-29-1

Their might be safety regulations though, as it is mildly radioactive and decays into radium.

thanks to all for your helpful replies. and apologies for my ignorance re- nomenclature.

heh... $50k is a little out of my price bracket. O_O

i did try american elements, as well as nanoshel, nova elements, and metallium. as you've pointed out, this apparently innocuous metal once used in lamps and welders isn't cheap, strangely enough ; the best quote i got so far was $1575 for 100g of thorium oxide.

there are some other suggestions in your replies that give me some interesting ideas to pursue. many thanks!

Algr said:

mildly radioactive

Not so mildly. You definitely want it behind glass and far away.

Vanadium 50 said:

Not so mildly. You definitely want it behind glass and far away.

The gift that keeps on giving.

How about a mixture of yttrium and zirconium with atomic weight 90? I bet such a gift has been given never before in the history of Man.

david007 said:

i did try american elements, as well as nanoshel, nova elements, and metallium. as you've pointed out, this apparently innocuous metal once used in lamps and welders isn't cheap, strangely enough ; the best quote i got so far was $1575 for 100g of thorium oxide.

Thorium is used as an alloying element. In lamps and tungsten welding rods, it is used in the oxide (ThO₂) form, as in thoriated-tungsten (~1-2% thoria).
The American Welding Society (AWS) has a position paper on thoriated-tungsten electrodes, and they recommend alternatives using ceria, lanthia, yttria or zirconia.
http://files.aws.org/technical/facts/FACT-27.pdf

Some people swear by thoriated-tungsten electrodes
https://www.thefabricator.com/thewe...-i-still-use-2-percent-thoriated-red-tungsten

I've watched them in use, and I would agree with the welder in the Fabricator article. Thoria has the highest melting point (~3370 +/- 20 °C) of all oxides.

Thorium has special uses as a source material for production of ²³³U, which is why there are certain restriction on the amount of material. While it is mildly radioactive, some of the daughter products are more radioactive (e.g., ²²⁸Ra, ²²⁸Ac, ²²⁴Ra, ²²⁰Rn. . .).
http://hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/hbase/Nuclear/radser.html#c2

Thoria (and decay daughters) can become airborne from alpha decay (atoms may recoil from the surface), hence the strong recommendation to have thorium in a sealed glass container.

Hornbein said:

How about a mixture of yttrium and zirconium with atomic weight 90? I bet such a gift has been given never before in the history of Man.

Zr-Y alloys have been made, but usually not as a gift. Usually, there are more elements involved.

Zirconium 90 is stable, and is the most common isotope of zirconium, making up 51.45% of all zirconium.

Algr said:

Zirconium 90 is stable, and is the most common isotope of zirconium, making up 51.45% of all zirconium.

and if one purchases pure Zr, then one will get the natural combination of 0.5145 ⁹⁰Zr, 0.1122 ⁹¹Zr, 0.1715 ⁹²Zr, 0.1738 ⁹⁴Zr and a wee bit of 0.0028 ⁹⁶Zr, and probably some Hf with it. A pure isotope of any element is quite expensive, except perhaps for those with one stable isotope, but one should expect a small fraction of impurities carried over from processing.

Astronuc said:

Some people swear by thoriated-tungsten electrodes

One weld of the LZ experiment cryostat was done with thoriated rods.. They know which one because they can see it in data.

Algr said:

making up 51.45% of all zirconium.

Typically isotopically pure materials start at $3000/g and go up from there. 90g will not be cheap.

Vanadium 50 said:

Typically isotopically pure materials start at $3000/g and go up from there. 90g will not be cheap.

So 90 mg /.5145 = 174 mg of regular zirconium. That way 90 mg of it will be zirconium-90. If there are other impurities, (eg. Cubic zirconia ZrO₂) adjust the quantity accordingly.

Yes, but the OP said "not looking for items that may contain thorium". So an isotopic mixture that contains Zr-90 doesn't meet the requirements.

Vanadium 50 said:

One weld of the LZ experiment cryostat was done with thoriated rods.. They know which one because they can see it in data.

Yes, I saw that.

The ²³²The levels, as measured by the ICP-MS system, resulted in 3.20±0.16 ppb of Th, in comparison to 0.069±0.007 ppb measured for the TIMET HN3469 stock.

That's already fairly low, but does not meet the need for ultralow background requirement for LZ and similar experiments.

Additionally, it was found that the standard lanthanated tungsten electrodes used do contain a small amount of thorium which, in the welding process, gets into the weld at the level of 0.7ppb.

https://link.springer.com/article/10.1140/epjc/s10052-020-8420-x

Most applications with which I'm familiar do not require such low background, and can tolerate ppb levels of ²³²Th or W in a weld. On the other hand, we practical, I advocate pulsed-magnetic welding (PMW), or what some call 'magnetic force welding' (MFW).

Vanadium 50 said:

Yes, but the OP said "not looking for items that may contain thorium". So an isotopic mixture that contains Zr-90 doesn't meet the requirements.

He's making a gift, not a nuke.

...right?

Algr said:

He's making a gift, not a nuke.

...right?

LOL. If I make it to 90 y/o, I would much appreciate the (not inexpensive) gift of the Lexan periodic table. I would not appreaciate a vial of gray sand. Just sayin'...

berkeman said:

a vial of gray sand

"I got a rock" - Charlie Brown

All the sources I have looked at have been in six figures for 90 g. It's also not clear to me how to ship it. I know FedEx will do (or at least has done) this, but it is not cheap. Then again, neither is the Thorium.

berkeman said:

Maybe give him the whole Periodic Table instead -- much more fun at parties!

View attachment 301394
https://www.physicsforums.com/threads/where-to-buy-thorium-90.1015140/

I have one of those .... they dont contain any of the radioactive elements ... all those positions are empty
I was somewhat disappointed

Dave

I've seen them with various ores and such. A piece of granite is reasonably safe. But don't expect plutonium or technicium.

BTW, plots of elements have small amounts of a radioactive isotope or two. Vanadium is an example.

davenn said:

I have one of those .... they dont contain any of the radioactive elements ... all those positions are empty
I was somewhat disappointed

Dave

Reminded me of https://xkcd.com/2643/