page_title: Carl Axel Arrhenius
section_title: Ytterbite
hierarchical_section_title: Carl Axel Arrhenius / Ytterbite
caption_attribution_description: English: Gadolinite-(Y) Locality: Ytterby, Resarö, Vaxholm, Uppland, Sweden (Locality at mindat.org) Size: 2.3 x 2.2 x 2.0 cm. Gadolinite is a rare yttrium, beryllium silicate found in granites and alkalic granitic pegmatites. This old-time, lustrous, waxy, partially euhedral crystal is from the Type Locality in Sweden - Ytterby, Uppland. This classic piece comes with an expertly handwritten, faded label from an older collection. The collection this came out of was a museum stash, dating to prior to World War I. Deutsch: Gadolinit-(Y) Fundort: Grube Ytterby, Resarö, Vaxholm, Uppland, Schweden (Fundort bei mindat.org) Größe: 2.3 x 2.2 x 2.0 cm.
context_page_description: Carl Axel Arrhenius was an officer in the Swedish army and an amateur geologist and chemist. He is best known for his discovery of the mineral ytterbite in 1787.
  The discovery of ytterbite was the first step in identifying an entire group of previously unknown elements, the rare earths.
  Eight stable rare earth elements were eventually extracted from ytterbite:
  terbium,
  dysprosium,
  holmium,
  erbium,
  thulium,
  ytterbium,
  lutetium,
  and yttrium.
context_section_description: During his time as a lieutenant in Vaxholm, Arrhenius visited the feldspar mine in the village of Ytterby on the island of Resarön. During this visit, in 1787, he found an unusually heavy dark mineral.
  The mineral's first description was published by Bengt Reinhold Geijer in Crell's Annalen in 1788, where he credited Arrhenius with the discovery of a "Schwerstein" or "heavy rock".  
  The mineral was eventually sent to the chemist Johan Gadolin at the University of Åbo for suitable analysis. In 1794, after careful chemical analysis, Gadolin reported that approximately 38% of the sample was a previously unknown "earth". (The idea of chemical element was not yet established.)  The compound that Gadolin isolated, the first rare-earth metal compound, is now known as Yttrium(III) oxide. It is composed of the first known rare-earth element, yttrium.
  Examining a different sample, Anders Gustaf Ekeberg confirmed the existence of a new "earth", calling it "yttria" and the source mineral "ytterbite".
  The mineral that Arrhenius discovered and Gadolin and Ekeberg analyzed was eventually renamed gadolinite in 1800.
  The rare-earths are chemically very similar to each other, almost always occur together in minerals on earth and are rarely found in isolation from other rare-earth elements. Their similarity and co-existence made their initial identification difficult.
  The discovery of ytterbite was the first step in a long process of investigations by many scientists in different countries. The identification of new "earths" extended over 100 years, and eventually led to the understanding of elements and their relationships in the periodic system. 
  Ytterbite was eventually found to contain eight stable  rare earth elements 
  (terbium, 
  dysprosium, 
  holmium,  
  erbium,  
  thulium, 
  ytterbium, 
  lutetium, 
  and yttrium). 
  Most of the remaining rare earths were found in the  mineral cerite, which contains seven rare earth elements (cerium, 
  lanthanum,  
  praseodymium,  
  neodymium, 
  samarium, 
  europium, 
  and gadolinium).
caption: A sample of ytterbite (later named gadolinite) from  Vaxholm
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