Chemical Element: gallium

(Modern Latin: chemical element; Gallia, the Latin name for the area that became France after the fall of the Roman Empire; metal)

Chemical-Element Information

Symbol: Ga
Atomic number: 31
Year discovered: 1875

Discovered by: Paul-Émile Lecoq de Boisbaudran (1838-1912), a French chemist.


  • Gallium was an element whose existence was predicted by Dmitry Ivanovich Mendeléyev in 1871 when he said that the then unknown element gallium should resemble aluminum in its properties.
  • He therefore suggested the name eka-aluminium (symbol Ea).
  • His predictions for the properties of gallium are remarkably close to reality.
  • Gallium was discovered spectroscopically by de Boisbaudran when he found a zinc ore that displayed hitherto unknown spectral lines.

Name in other languages:

French: gallium

German: Gallium

Italian: gallio

Spanish: galio


Information about other elements may be seen at this Chemical Elements List.

A special unit about words that include chemo-, chem- may be seen here.