High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! Vanadium ( /v??ne?di?m/ v?-nay-dee-?m) is a chemical element with the symbol V and atomic number 23. It is a hard, silvery gray, ductile and malleable transition metal. The formation of an oxide layer stabilizes the metal against oxidation. The element is found only in chemically combined form in nature. Andres Manuel del Rio discovered vanadium in 1801 by analyzing a new lead-bearing mineral he called "brown lead," and named the new element erythronium (Greek for "red") since, upon heating, most of its salts turned from their initial color to red. Four years later, however, he was convinced by other scientists that erythronium was identical to chromium. The element was rediscovered in 1831 by Nils Gabriel Sefstrom, who named it vanadium after the Germanic goddess of beauty and fertility, Vanadis (Freyja). Both names were attributed to the wide range of colors found in vanadium compounds. Del Rio's lead mineral was later renamed vanadinite...