Periodic Table, Mendeleev and STS education - the case of a public exhibition

Abstract

The commemoration of the international year of the Periodic Table in 2019 alerted the scientific community to the need to spread to the general public the importance of the design of this iconic instrument of chemical thinking, in which it consists and what allows us to understand what exists or may exist. The organization of a thematic exhibition, historically framed, contextualizing the chemical elements in terms of abundance, mineral sources and technological applications, was the purpose of a group of professors and researchers from the University of Aveiro who in partnership with the Living Science Factory of the University of Aveiro and the American Corner of the University of Aveiro conceived and developed it. All the constituent pieces of the exhibition, entitled “What if Mendeleev were here?”, were specially designed for this purpose. We tried to make known some relevant milestones in the history of science for the creation of the Periodic Table, the discovery of Mendeleev’s contacts with Portugal and a large periodic table was designed and constructed, highlighting, for each element, information relevant from the chemical point of view, as well as some applications. The world of materials is finite and many of the transformations are irreversible. Understanding that the sustainability of the planet depends on the controlled consumption of the sources of chemical elements is, in fact, essential.