Warning! This article is informative, popular science and humorous-entertaining in nature! Alas, although now it is possible to create gold from lead, this process is very capacious and leads to insignificant results.
Introductory information
At the beginning of the last century, papyrus was found in the tomb of the Egyptian city of Thebes. It contained 111 recipes, among which were those that considered the possibility of obtaining silver and gold. But, alas, this was aimed at creating fakes or coating with precious metals other, less expensive, objects.
Nevertheless, this document showed that even in ancient times, alchemy captured the minds of people longing for easy money. Spreading through the Egyptians and Greeks, it was able to gradually capture the whole of Europe. The greatest practical dawn came in the Middle Ages. Then alchemy was interested not only in scientists, but also in state and church ranks. So, at almost every imperial palace one could find “specialized” people who were supposed to get gold in order to improve the state of the treasury. It is widely believed that this can be done with the help of a philosopher's stone.
What could be achieved in the Middle Ages
Iron, gold, lead and mercury were considered close metals - that one of them could be converted to another. For example, take the Lullia recipe. He suggested looking at lead and burning it until an oxide of this metal was obtained. Then it was necessary to heat the resulting substance with acidic grape alcohol in a sand bath. The gum obtained from evaporation was distilled. What remained was necessary to grind on a stone and touch it with hot coal. Then it was necessary to once again overtake the substance and obtained acetic-lead salt.
What is the value of this compound? In fact, the usual chemical reaction is described, namely the distillation of acetic-lead salt. This mix could really work wonders. Namely, to restore gold from solutions of its salts.
Further development
Alchemy flourished until the mid-seventeenth century. Gold, like other materials, could not be obtained from lead. Although chemistry was studied quite well. High-ranking officials of that time supported such hobbies, which had a positive effect on the development of applied research. Moreover, many rulers, kings and emperors were themselves alchemists. And many of the transformations carried out by them are not a lie, just a precious metal was contained in the starting material and it was simply isolated.
But over time, the number of people who would believe in alchemy began to decline. A lot of this was facilitated by the fact that as a panacea for all diseases, a philosopher's stone was declared. When this did not materialize in practice, they began to doubt alchemy. Although not completely disappointed. Many experiments nevertheless made it possible to obtain gold. True, this was due to the fact that in some natural ores this precious metal is contained in a certain amount. Thanks to various chemical reactions, it turned out to be purified and distilled.
The first "success"
Alchemist Hobmerg was able to get gold by melting silver with antimony ore. There was not much precious metal at the exit. But the alchemist believed that the secret of the transformation of metals was revealed to him. True, with an already accurate analysis, it simply turned out that a certain percentage of gold was from the very beginning.
Pharmacist Kappel in 1783 was able to achieve a similar result - he received a precious metal from silver, using arsenic. Perhaps this is solely due to the precipitation of lead iodide. And gold, as you probably guessed, was already in the ore.
Using science
After the atoms and transformation reactions were discovered, nuclear physicists replaced the alchemists. The basis in this case was laid by Dempster Arthur Jeffrey. Studying the mass spectrographic data of the precious metal, the scientist came to the conclusion that there is only one stable isotope with a mass number of 197. Therefore, if you want to make gold out of lead (or turn other similar material), then you need to ensure that the necessary nuclear reaction takes place. It is necessary that it gives exactly the isotope 197 at the output.
In 1940, this issue began to be studied in more detail. Experiments were carried out on fast neutron bombardment of neighboring elements of the periodic table. These are platinum and mercury. A year later it was reported - using the second material, success was achieved. Gold was received. But its isotopes had mass numbers 198, 199 and 200. Scientists received gold, but it existed for a very short period of time. Although it was concluded from experiments that the best starting material is mercury. Obtaining gold from lead is also theoretically possible, but realizing it is much more difficult.
Mercury mining
The most suitable material for manipulation is a material with a mass number of 196 and 199. Thus, out of 100 grams of mercury, approximately 35 μg of gold can be calculated. It is easy to guess that due to the high cost of nuclear transformations, the price was much more than the market price. Therefore, this method has not gained popularity.
Obtaining a stable isotope (gold-197) is theoretically possible on an industrial scale from mercury-197. That's just such a chemical element in nature does not exist. Although you can pay attention to thallium-201. The truth here is a problem of a different nature - this element does not have alpha decay. Therefore, the production of the mercury-197 isotope is still more relevant.
You can get it from thallium-197 or lead-197. It would seem, at first glance, the second option is much easier. But in this way, it is more difficult to get gold from lead, because these materials do not exist in nature and must be synthesized through nuclear transformations. That is, you can make precious metal, only it is very difficult and costly. And so the considered option is the most real answer to how to make gold out of lead.
Cold fusion
Now gold cannot be made from lead at home - this is too knowledge-intensive and costly process. And this is due to the fact that it is necessary to conduct hot nuclear fusion. That is, it is necessary to achieve significant temperatures, which in itself is very costly from an energy point of view.
If it is possible to start cold nuclear fusion, then it will be possible to obtain a precious metal at relatively low cost. True, in this case, the issue of how to stop it / keep it under control is relevant.
Moreover, receiving gold in huge quantities, mankind may cease to value it. After all, this metal is valuable not only because of its qualities and characteristics, but also because it exists in limited quantities. And with cold fusion it is necessary to take into account that the conversion of the elements of the periodic table can be carried out only in one direction - from right to left. In this case, lead is very well suited for its conversion to gold. But this, alas, is still in theory.
Conclusion
It is often asked what is heavier than gold or lead. This is an incorrectly asked question. After all, a kilogram will always be the same weight. More relevant and correct is the question of volume. Or more scientifically - the density of matter. In this regard, gold occupies a leading position. Among the common and well-known materials, it is No. 1 in terms of volume-to-weight ratio. The closest material that comes to his heels is tungsten. By the way, it is from him that the most often considered precious metal is faked. This is due to the fact that for some characteristics these metals differ by percent.
Various materials, which are considered as the turn to turn into gold, can have a multiple difference in volume / weight characteristics. By the way, thanks to this, many are not quite guided by how difficult it is to transfer this precious resource. For example, it is very difficult, if not impossible, for an adult man to raise a gold bar the size of an average school satchel.