Selenium History

Selenium was discovered by Berzelius in 1818. It is named for the Greek for "moon", selene. The discovery of selenium was an important finding, but at the same time seemingly accidental. Fellow scientist Martin Klaproth, discovered a contamination of sulfuric acid creating a red colored product which he believed to be due to the element tellurium. However, Berzelius went on to further analyze the impurity and came to the conclusion that it was an unknown element that shared similar properties to those of tellurium. Based off of the Greek word “selene,” meaning moon, Jons Berzelius decided to call the newly found element selenium.