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native element

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native element

Any of the 19 chemical elements that occur as minerals and are found in nature uncombined with other elements. They are commonly divided into three groups: metals (platinum, iridium, osmium, iron, zinc, tin, gold, silver, copper, mercury, lead, chromium); semimetals (bismuth, antimony, arsenic, tellurium, selenium); and nonmetals (sulfur, carbon). Members of the group of native elements form under widely varying physicochemical conditions and in very different rock types. Many deposits are sufficiently abundant to be commercially important.


native element [′nād·iv ′el·ə·mənt]
(geology)
Any of 20 elements, such as copper, gold, and silver, which occur naturally uncombined in a nongaseous state; there are three groups—metals, semimetals, and nonmetals.


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Soon the Nautilus returned to her native element, and the manometer showed that she was about thirty feet deep.
But out of his native element the ape-man was too greatly handicapped to do more than excite the monster to greater speed as it dragged its prey swiftly through the water.
Most of them walked into the water as though into a native element.
 
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