n. In 1900 Brauner announced his belief that, thorium, as generally known, is separable into two different elements. A little later Baskerville, working by a different method, came to the same conclusion, and in 1903 claimed to have effected its separation into three components, for two of which he proposed the new names carolinium and berzelium, retaining the name thorium for the third component. Later he found for this new or purified thorium an atomic weight of 220.1–220.6. In 1905 R. J. Meyer and A. Gumperz published the results of a careful revision of the previous work on this subject, which they found did not afford any evidence in support of the earlier claims of the separability of thorium. Thorium is a radioactive element and is the parent of a series of radioactive products of which eight separate members have already been identified. These are known as mesothorium 1, mesothorium 2, radiothorium, thorium X, thorium emanation, thorium A, thorium B, and thorium C, and are ordinarily present in thorium compounds. Thorium and its products appear to constitute a separate radioactive group or family, distinct from the uranium group, of which actinium, ionium, radium, and polonium are members, although generally found associated with it in minerals. Thorium itself emits only a-rays, but, owing to the presence of thorium disintegration-products, β- and γ-rays are also given out by thorium compounds.n. Chemical symbol, Th; atomic weight, 231.9. The metallic base of the earth thoria, discovered by Berzelius, in 1828, in a mineral from Norway, to which the name of thorite is now given, and which consists essentially of the silicate of thorium.