thorium
THOR-ee-uhm
Definition
A radioactive metallic chemical element often used in radiometric dating techniques, such as uranium-thorium dating, to determine the age of geological samples.
Etymology
Named by the Swedish chemist Jöns Jacob Berzelius in 1828 after Thor, the Norse god of thunder, reflecting the discoverer's interest in Nordic mythology.
In the news
The article mentions uranium-thorium dating as one of the specific scientific methods used by researchers to determine the approximate age of the animal bone fragments found in the Norwegian cave.
In a Norwegian cave in 2025, scientists found 75,000-year-old bones of polar bears, walruses, and bowhead whales — and the remains of a species of lemming now extinct in Europe that had never been found in Scandinavia before
Read the full article ↗ScienceBlog.com