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Chromium is a hard steel-gray metal that is used in alloys to increase strength and corrosion resistance. It also has many other uses as an element in a variety of industrial applications.
Overview of chromium
There are two stable oxidation states of chromium: Cr6 + (Cr(VI)), a toxic, water-soluble oxyanions chromate and bichromate; and Cr3 + (Cr(III)), a nontoxic, largely insoluble oxide. At the Earth’s surface, hexavalent Cr is primarily present in chromium nitrate and chromate precipitates while trivalent Cr occurs as ferrochromium (FeCr2O4) of the spinel group or uvarovite (Ca3Cr2(SiO4)3) of the garnet group.
Chromium isotopes have been identified in a wide range of rock minerals including chromite, uvarovite, and crocoite. Variations in chromium isotope content have been used to study the origin and evolution of the solar system.
53Cr is a radiogenic decay product of 53Mn and can be used to assess isotopic systematics in differentiated planetary bodies. In addition, 53Cr/52Cr and Mn-Cr isotope ratios are found in meteorites which provide additional evidence for nucleosynthetic processes immediately before the emergence of our solar system.
ICP-MS/HTC-IRMS analysis
Chromium-53 can be detected using ion cyclotron acceleration mass spectrometry (ICP-AES) with high-temperature conversion isotope ratio mass spectrometry (HTC-IRMS). The main advantage of this technique is that it has 10-100 times improved detection limits for trace elements, making it a very reliable and fast method for detecting chromium in samples.
d53Cr values of shells from some modern bivalves are systematically offset from seawater, suggesting that the ocean redox state has been changing over time. This information can be used to reconstruct past redox states and link those changes to climatic events.