Alkali Earth Metal of the Week: Barium

For my own reference, alkali earth metals make up the second family of the perodic table. Alkali earth metals usually give up two electrons in a chemical compound. They are too reactive to be found in their pure state in nature, and they are denser and not as soft as alkali metals.

The following site had lots of interesting trivia about alkali earth metals, and I got carried away reading about all of the earth metals, instead of focusing on barium, my alkali earth metal of the week: http://www.theodoregray.com/PeriodicTable/Elements/056/index.s7.html#sample3

Barium caught my attention because I remember that in connection with radiation cancer treatments in the 1970s, my great grandmother had to have barium enemas. I thought that I remembered her drinking a barium concoction that she found revolting, but after doing some research, I'm not so sure that my recollection of 30 years ago is accurate. I did learn that a barium solution is injected into the colon for a lower gastrointestinal x-rays to "illuminate" the colon and reveal polyps or other abnormalities on the x-ray image.

I came across an interesting study in which the author suggested that there is a link between higher concentrations of barium in the the soil and increased incidence of multiple sclerosis and other deriorative neurlogical diseases. The article is at http://www.wnho.net/BariumPoisoningStudy.pdf.