This article has been reviewed and approved by the following Topic Editor: Sidney Draggan (other articles)
Background
Manganese is gray-white metal with a pinkish tinge, and a very brittle but hard metallic element. Its atomic number is 25. In 1774, while heating the mineral pyrolusite (MnO2, manganese dioxide) in a charcoal fire, the Swedish scientist Johann Gahn discovered manganese. The heat and carbon in the charcoal separated oxygen from the pyrolusite, leaving a metallic manganese residue. This chemical reaction is called a reduction reaction.
Manganese is a reactive element that easily combines with ions in water and air. In the Earth, manganese is found in a number of minerals of different chemical and physical properties, but is never found as a free metal in nature. The most important mineral is pyrolusite, because it is the main ore mineral for manganese. When manganese is alloyed with other metals like aluminum, copper and antimony, the end product is magnetic.
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