Nils Sefström, discoverer of the chemical element vanadium or not?

2 June 1787, Sweden - 30 November 1845, Klara Church Parish (Sweden)

Nils Gabriel Sefström studied chemistry and was a student and disciple of Jöns Jacob Berzelius (the father of modern chemical notation). While studying minerals associated with steel, he discovered a chemical element, vanadium.

However, the same element had previously been discovered by the Spanish-Mexican Andrés Manuel del Río, in 1801, and he had named it erythrone (although many mistakenly call it eritronium).

Later, Friedrich Wöhler (the first to isolate beryllium and metallic alumnium) confirmed that vanadium and erythrone were the same substance. Nevertheless, the officially accepted name is vanadium.

Nils Sefström named his discovery after Vanadis, the Scandinavian goddess of love and beauty.

Vanadium, symbol V, has atomic number 23 on the periodic table and is placed in group 5. It is a ductile metal, but hard and not very abundant in nature. It is found in various ores and is mainly used in some alloys.