10 interesting facts about gold

Image credit: Perth Mint

Gold is a precious metal, high value, but you may not be able to fully understand it. Here are 10 interesting facts about gold that you might not know before.

1. Gold is probably the first metal that prehistoric humans had processed. The age of the gold jewelry which archaeologist found in Bulgaria can date back to 4000 BC. So, the Age of gold emerged just overlapped with the Stone Age.

2. The 7th century BC, gold wire was used to install false tooth by Italian dentist. Since the early 16th century, gold filling was recommended for filling the cavity.
3. In Aztec, gold is written as “teocuitlatl”, which means “Gold’s shit”.
4. Gold with high ductility and malleability. With casting, a piece of one ounce of gold can be turned into five millionths inch thick semi-transparent gold. Or can be stretched to fifty miles long and five microns in diameter, equivalent to one-tenth of the diameter of a hair.
5. The precious metal also has the characteristics of difficult to destroy. From ancient times to the present, it has been said that “Gold has its price.”  So we can recycle them. All the gold discovered in the past, eighty-five percent are still in use today.

6. Outside the lunar module of the United States “Apollo ” airship was coated with gold foil, with the aim to protect astronauts from radiation. Even now, the helmet worn by astronauts is still coated with a thin gold membrane to protect astronaut’s eyes from intense light.
7. The methods of refining gold will destroy the environment in some extent. Gold mine will dumped a lot of cyanide into the ditch, and pour the nitrogen oxides and sulfur oxides into the air.
8. In gold reserve, the United States ranks first in the world. However, if included the gold ornaments, then India will grab the top spot, twenty percent of the gold used as decoration in the world, were used in Indian saris.
9. On the surface of the Earth, the greatest concentration of gold is in ocean, it’s estimated at around one hundred million tons. Unfortunately, so far no one has found an effective method to extract gold from the ocean.
10. However, compared with the gold reserves in space, that is dwarfed. According to the data of NEAR airship sent back in 1999. The amount of gold at one planet of “Eros” is more than the sum of that has ever been mined on the earth. Regrettably, we don’t know how to mine the gold in space.

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