Ordering the Platinum Metals — The Contribution of Julia V. Lermontova (1846/47–1919)

The six platinum-group metals are ruthenium (Ru), rhodium (Rh), palladium (Pd), osmium (Os), iridium (Ir) and platinum (Pt). They have fairly similar physical and chemical properties. They occur together in the same mineral deposits. So it is difficult to separate them from each other chemically. Separating them was necessary in order to determine their atomic weights and to find their place in the periodic table, which initially was ordered by increasing atomic weight [Griffith, 2008]. In 1871, a woman named Julia Vsevolodovna Lermontova worked on the separation process of the platinum group, a topic which had been discussed in the chemical community for a long time…