1.
Sir William Ramsey is one scientist credited with identifying the noble gas argon. Sir Ramsey
separated nitrogen gas from the air and reacted it with an excess of magnesium, producing solid
magnesium nitride. However, a small sample of an unreactive gas remained with a density different
from the density of the nitrogen gas. Sir Ramsey identified the unreactive gas as argon and later
went on to discover neon, krypton, and xenon.
State, in terms of valence electrons, why the noble gases that Sir Ramsey discovered have similar
chemical properties.