Vanadium (V)
Vanadium metal ingot - one troy ounce - .999 bullion First discovered by Andrés Manuel del Río in Mexico in 1801, a claim he later abandoned when a French chemist suggested it was merely an impure chromium sample, yet only to be rediscovered in 1831 by Swedish chemist Nils Gabriel Sefström and named vanadium by him after the goddess Vanadís (aka Freyja) as he likened the many beautiful colors of its compounds to the passion, beauty and fertility of this goddess from Norse mythology. Vanadium is a transition metal that is found in many compounds in nature yet its metallic form is only very rarely found here, it is very hard yet ductile, conductive of electricity yet thermally insulating and is corrosion resistant. The vast majority of the world's supply of vanadium comes from China, Russia, and South Africa. About 85% of annual vanadium production is alloyed with steel to greatly increase it strength. In fact one of the first major industrial uses of ferrovanadium was in creating