different between coltan vs columbite

English

Etymology

Blend of columbite +? tantalite.

Noun

coltan (plural coltans)

1. A metallic ore, (Fe,Mn)(Ta,Nb)₂O₆, from which the elements niobium and tantalum are extracted.

   Synonym: columbite-tantalite

   • 2007, Elizabeth Grossman, High Tech Trash, Island Press (?ISBN), page 46:

     […] as of 2003 over one billion cell phones were in use worldwide, so by the time the high-tech bubble approached its bursting point in 2000 and 2001, coltan had become an extremely hot commodity.

   • 2014, Adam Schatz, ‘Ça va un peu’, London Review of Books, vol. 36 no. 20:

     Consider your mobile phone. Before it was assembled in a Chinese factory, the coltan in its capacitors may have been dug by miners in the Eastern Congo, where millions have died in a series of wars over ‘conflict minerals’, though we give this no more thought than previous generations of Westerners gave to the Congolese origins of the ivory in their piano keys, the rubber in their tyres, the copper in their bullet casings or the uranium in their bombs.

Translations

Further reading

• David Barthelmy (1997–2021) , “Coltan”, in Webmineral Mineralogy Database
• coltan on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

Anagrams

• Calton, locant

Dutch

Pronunciation

• Hyphenation: col?tan

Noun

coltan m (uncountable)

1. coltan

French

Noun

coltan m (uncountable)

1. coltan

Spanish

Noun

coltan m (uncountable)

1. coltan

English

Etymology

From columbium (“niobium”) +? -ite.

Noun

columbite (plural columbites)

1. (mineralogy) A black mineral that is a mixed iron and manganese niobate and tantalate, and is the main ore of niobium and tantalum.

Derived terms

• coltan
• columbite-tantalite

Translations