Indium is a very soft, silvery-white metal with a brilliant lustre. The pure metal gives a high-pitched "scream" when bent. It wets glass, as does gallium. It is useful for making low-melting alloys. An alloy of 24% indium and 76% gallium is liquid at room temperature. Canada produces the majority of of the world's supply of indium.
Small and large samples of indium wire like this, as well as foil, and sheet, can be purchased fromAdvent Research Materials via their web catalogue.
Indium wasdiscovered by Ferdinand Reich, Hieronymus Theodor Richter in 1863 at Germany.Origin of name: named after theindigo line in its atomic spectrum.
Isotope abundances of indium with the most intense signal set to 100%.
Indium has two stable isotopes and one of them, In-113, is used for the production of radioisotopes. In-113 is used for the production of Sn-113 and can also be used for the production of the medical radioisotope In-110, although the most common production route for that radioisotope is via Cd-110.
Isolation: indium would not normally be made in the laboratory as it is commercially available. Indium is a byproduct of the formation of lead and zinc. Indium metal is isolated by the electrolysis of indium salts in water. Further processes are required to make very pure indium for electronics purposes.
Density of solid: 7310 kg m-3
Molar volume: 15.76 cm3
Thermal conductivity: 82 W m‑1 K‑1
Melting point: 429.75 [156.6 °C (313.88 °F)] K
Boiling point: 2345 [2072 °C (3762 °F)] K
Enthalpy of fusion: 20.5 kJ mol-1
Atomic radius (empirical): 155 pm
Molecular single bond covalent radius: 142 (coordination number 3) ppm
van der Waals radius: 243 ppm
Pauling electronegativity: 1.78 (Pauling units)
Allred Rochow electronegativity: 1.49 (Pauling units)
Mulliken-Jaffe electronegativity: 1.76 (sp2 orbital)
First ionisation energy: 558.30 kJ mol‑1
Second ionisation energy: 1820.72 kJ mol‑1
Third ionisation energy: 2705.85 kJ mol‑1
Universe: 0.3 ppb by weight
Crustal rocks: 160 ppb by weight
Human: (no data) ppb by weight
