Claim: Kolyma has reserves of natural resources.

Tungsten , also known as wolfram , is a chemical element with symbol W and atomic number 74 . The word tungsten comes from the Swedish language tung sten , which directly translates to heavy stone . Its name in Swedish is volfram , however , in order to distinguish it from scheelite , which is alternatively named tungsten in Swedish .   A hard , rare metal under standard conditions when uncombined , tungsten is found naturally on Earth almost exclusively in chemical compounds . It was identified as a new element in 1781 , and first isolated as a metal in 1783 . Its important ores include wolframite and scheelite . The free element is remarkable for its robustness , especially the fact that it has the highest melting point of all the elements discovered , melting at 3,422 ° C , 6,192 ° F. Its high density is 19.3 times that of water , comparable to that of uranium and gold , and much higher -LRB- about 1.7 times -RRB- than that of lead . Polycrystalline tungsten is an intrinsically brittle and hard material , making it difficult to work . However , pure single-crystalline tungsten is more ductile , and can be cut with a hard-steel hacksaw .   Tungsten 's many alloys have numerous applications , including incandescent light bulb filaments , X-ray tubes -LRB- as both the filament and target -RRB- , electrodes in TIG welding , superalloys , and radiation shielding . Tungsten 's hardness and high density give it military applications in penetrating projectiles . Tungsten compounds are also often used as industrial catalysts .   Tungsten is the only metal from the third transition series that is known to occur in biomolecules , where it is used in a few species of bacteria and archaea . It is the heaviest element known to be essential to any living organism . Tungsten interferes with molybdenum and copper metabolism and is somewhat toxic to animal life .