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Updated: Jun 19, 2026

A Simple, Low-cost, and Robust System to Measure the Volume of Hydrogen Evolved by Chemical Reactions with Aqueous Solutions
Published on: August 17, 2016
A little bit of lithium does a lot for hydrogen
Eva Zurek1, Roald Hoffmann, N W Ashcroft
1Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology, Baker Laboratory, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 14853, USA.
Abstract:
From detailed assessments of electronic structure, we find that a combination of significantly quantal elements, six of seven atoms being hydrogen, becomes a stable metal at a pressure approximately 1/4 of that required to metalize pure hydrogen itself. The system, LiH(6) (and other LiH(n)), may well have extensions beyond the constituent lithium. These hypothetical materials demonstrate that nontraditional stoichiometries can considerably expand the view of chemical combination under moderate pressure.
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