discovery of silicon & how is it extracted commercially

EmuWizard

what lead to the discovery of silicon

&

how is it extracted commercially & how can it be done at home aswell?

Borek

Our usual rates for doing other people homework start at $100/hour. But once you will show what you did by yourself and where you get stuck, we will push you in the right direction for free.

EmuWizard

sry for bieng so blunt & so naive :p

i got this much so far. It was only identified in 1787 by a scientist Lavoisier. However, Berzelius was the first person to isolate silicon in 1823, and thus he is credited with its discovery (web1.caryacademy.org). the thing is i cant find out why he was doing what he was doing, i cant find anyinfo on that.

& i found my info about how it is extracted commercially, apparently they take out the impurities by heeting it with coke in a blast furnace. but i need a small scale experiment too which i cant find. i can only think of mixing it with sumthing to react with the oxygen & leave wat i need behind.

Borek

I am not sure if I understand the first question, as the only answer I am aware of is "curiosity". What I mean is that chemists were trying at the time to decompose every substance into what they called "simple substances" - what we today know as elements (note: don't treat nomenclature I am using too seriously, as I am translating from Polish). Berzelius was the first one to succeed in preparing pure silicon, but I don't remember reading about any special events that lead to that discovery.

Small scale & home experiment looks unlikely to me, you need high temperatures for SiO₂ reduction. Does it have to be production of Si, or something else where Si compounds are involved will do as well?

EmuWizard

lol thats good enough answer for me aswell.

& yes it has to specificcally be Silicon, as im doing a report on it.