Gold

Gold has been prized by people since the earliest times for making statues and icons and also for jewellery to adorn their bodies. Intricately sculptured art objects and adornment jewellery have been uncovered in the Sumerian royal Tombs in southern Iraq and the tombs of Egyptian kings. Significant buildings and religious temples and statues have been covered with thinly beaten sheets of gold. Due to its rarity, gold has long been considered a symbol of wealth and power of its possessor.
In 2001, it was estimated that 2870 tons of gold were produced worldwide. About 80 percent of that gold production was used to make jewellery, the majority of which was sold in India, Europe and the United States of America.14k Gold Jewellery is very common among jewellery pieces. Gold jewellery is universally popular, loved for its lustrous yellow colour and untarnishing character.

Each year approximately 660 tons of gold are used in telecommunications, information technology, medical treatments, and various industrial applications. Due to its high electrical conductivity, gold is a vital component of many electrical devices, including computers. It is used in the manufacture of approximately 50 million computers each year, as well as millions of televisions, DVDs, VCRs, video cameras and mobile phones. Gold has been used in medicine since 1927, when it was found to be useful in the treatment of rheumatoid arthritis.

Gold's has many unique properties and is a remarkable, rare metal, with an unparalleled combination of chemical and physical properties. It is the only yellow metal. Moreover, it is the only metal that forms no oxide film on its surface in air at normal temperatures, meaning that it will never rust or tarnish.
Gold's chemical symbol, Au, comes from the Latin word for gold, aurum. In the Periodic Table of Elements, gold is classified as a transitional metal with the following characteristics;