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deuterium

[ doo-teer-ee-uhm, dyoo- ]

noun

, Chemistry.
  1. an isotope of hydrogen, having twice the mass of ordinary hydrogen; heavy hydrogen. : 2 H, D; : 2.01; : 1.


deuterium

/ djuːˈtɪərɪəm /

noun

  1. a stable isotope of hydrogen, occurring in natural hydrogen (156 parts per million) and in heavy water: used as a tracer in chemistry and biology. Symbol: D or ²H; atomic no: 1; atomic wt: 2.014; boiling pt: –249.7°C
“Collins English Dictionary — Complete & Unabridged” 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012


deuterium

/ do̅o̅-tîrē-əm /

  1. An isotope of hydrogen whose nucleus has one proton and one neutron and whose atomic mass is 2. Deuterium is used widely as a tracer for analyzing chemical reactions, and it combines with oxygen to form heavy water.
  2. Also called heavy hydrogen
  3. See Note at heavy water


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Word History and Origins

Origin of deuterium1

1933; < Greek deúter ( os ) second ( deutero- ) + -ium
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Word History and Origins

Origin of deuterium1

C20: New Latin; see deutero- , -ium ; from the fact that it is the second heaviest hydrogen isotope
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Compare Meanings

How does deuterium compare to similar and commonly confused words? Explore the most common comparisons:

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Example Sentences

Within the atmosphere were signs of deuterium—a heavy isotope of hydrogen that can result from the breakdown of water.

While free hydrogen atoms that were once part of a water molecule escape into space, free deuterium weighs enough to hang around in the air.

From Time

If all of Mars’s water had escaped to space, taking its free hydrogen atoms with it, there would be much more deuterium in the modern day Martian sky relative to the remaining free hydrogen—by some measures, more than twice as much.

From Time

Every second, the LUNA experiment fires 100 trillion protons at a target of deuterium.

In 2014, Cooke and co-authors precisely measured the abundance of deuterium in the universe through observations of faraway gas clouds.

From that, they extracted the ratio of the number of deuterium atoms to the number of hydrogen atoms.

They found that there are roughly 1,900 hydrogen atoms for each deuterium atom in the water on Comet 67P.

However, even that ginormous difference still shows about three times the amount of deuterium than we see on our planet.

One chemical test involves measuring the relative amount of deuterium in water.

For example, a common type of meteorite has similar mineral content to Earth, but a lot less deuterium.

Deuterons or alpha particles are obtained in a similar fashion using deuterium or helium gas in place of hydrogen.

"It's true that one of the possibilities in building a hydrogen bomb concerns deuterium," the scientist said.

Well, heavy water is made of one atom of oxygen plus two atoms of deuterium, which is the first isotope of hydrogen.

Then, for a considerably higher price, he would undertake to collect a sample of the deuterium they were using.

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deuteridedeuterium oxide