People might be surprised to discover that uranium, a metal synonymous with nuclear war, is actually (chemically speaking at least) quite delicate. Cut a piece of it in two and it slowly turns dark as its atoms oxidize leaving it without the telltale luster that one expects to see in a metal. As the case with other reactive elements, one approach to deal with this problem is to leave it in mineral oil so as to create a barrier away from oxygen. But the oxygen atom is very small and slips past the spacious atomic gaps in liquids to eventually find their target.

A more sophisticated approach is to deny oxygen passage by sealing it behind the much more effective barrier that is glass and bathe it liberally with argon gas as extra protection. The approach would work just fine with uranium also except not in a practical sense: uranium is so dense that even a small piece of it can gather sufficient momentum to crack itself out of its protective cocoon. Nearly inaccessible to the average person, uranium is also quite pricey through regulations putting encapsulation into crack-prone glass capsules inadvisable. So for years we’ve been offering the well-received turnings that despite being pitch black due to surface oxidation still provide a compelling collectible for the scientifically inclined.

But, of course, there’s always a subset of those who want their cake and eat it too. And for them we now offer the “deluxe” version. Trapped in acrylic each of these cubes holds a sizable 10 to 15 gram sample of pure uranium metal that remains lustrous. How did we do it? It just comes down to timing. The supplier cut the pieces under an argon-filled glovebox for preservation then sent them in leak-proof containers which were not opened until the very moment the resin was being prepared. Exposed for only a few seconds in open air a trace veneer of uranium dioxide actually enhances the aesthetics giving this normally gray-looking metal a brassy makeover which should remain bright for as long as the cube is intact.

Despite the collective dread that uranium poses to most people, this metal is not very radioactive. It is pure depleted uranium meaning that the small percentage of the isotope that is fissionable was taken out and the bulk discarded by some U.S. government agency or other as “junk”. A number of stipulations set out legal ownership of uranium metal the sternest of which is that it may not be exported to another country without a license. Don’t break this rule if you don’t want the feds to show up at your doorstep!