The Government has offered Australia's three mobile operators, and vividwireless, renewal of their existing spectrum allocated on 15 year licences in the late 90s and early 2000s at set prices, while the Government expects to rake in $3 billion.
It's amazing how this week's so-called discovery of "Kryptonite" has set the world abuzz. However, there are three facts: the mineral discovered in Serbia is not related to the element Krypton; it is not a green rock fragment from Superman's home planet; and it is merely a chemical compound containing similar elements to the description of Kryptonite in the latest Superman movie.
In fact, the new mineral, discovered by
UK-Australian mining giant Rio Tinto in Jadar, Serbia, is a white
powder which has a chemical formula of sodium lithium boron silicate
hydroxide and has been named Jadarite. It is admittedly an astonishing
coincidence that the chemical description for Kryptonite used in the
2006 movie Superman Returns was sodium lithium boron silicate hydroxide
with fluorine.
However, what is probably not a coincidence is that the fictional
Superman's fictional home planet Krypton bears the same name and
spelling as a real element on the chemical periodic table.
Krypton, the element, is an inert gas that belongs to the same family
of elements as Helium, Argon and Neon, and was discovered on May 30,
1898 by Sir William Ramsay, a Scottish chemist. Like Neon, it has been
used in lighting applications such as advertising signs. Jerry Siegel,
the co-creator of Superman, born in 1914, was a science fiction buff
and probably well aware of Krypton and some of its properties. Why he
chose to give Superman's home planet the same name is not clear.
It is also probably not a coincidence that the recent Superman movie
added the words "with fluorine" to the chemical formula of Kryptonite.
Krypton is technically labelled an inert gas, meaning that it should
not be able to combine with other elements to form chemical compounds.
However, in fact, Krypton is known to be able to form compounds with
Fluorine.
Is there another angle to this story that makes it more than a mere
curiosity? Perhaps. Lithium is one of the most promising energy storage
sources for portable applications. Unfortunately, like fossil fuels, it
is in limited supply. The discovery of naturally occurring Jadarite,
however, may provide an important new source of Lithium for use in
Lithium Ion batteries.
David Bass
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