Nitrogen, the most abundant element in our atmosphere, is crucial to life. Nitrogen is found in soils and plants, in the water we drink, and in the air we breathe.

All living organisms need nitrogen in order to build proteins and build DNA. Most animals get nitrogen they need by eating plants.

Nitrogen is a crucially important component for all life. It is an important part of many cells and processes such as amino acids, proteins and even our DNA. It is also needed to make chlorophyll in plants, which is used in photosynthesis to make their food.

Nitrogen is important to the chemical industry. It is used to make fertilisers, nitric acid, nylon, dyes and explosives. To make these products, nitrogen must first be reacted with hydrogen to produce ammonia. This is done by the Haber process.

In the open ocean, as on land, fixed nitrogen is one of the most important growth-limiting nutrients for photosynthetic organisms (primary producers) such as algae and marine bacteria. Nitrogen can also serve as an energy source or as an oxidant for marine bacteria and archaea.

Fun Facts About Nitrogen

• Nitrogen is non-toxic, odorless, and colourless.
• It is not flammable.
• Nitrogen gas is slightly lighter than air once it reaches room temperature.
• Nitrogen was first liquefied on April 15, 1883, by Polish physicists Zygmunt Wróblewski and Karol Olszewski.
• Nitrogen is 75% of the air we breathe.

Facts:

• N has no odor, is tasteless, and colorless.
• Nitrogen gas (N2) makes up 78.1% of the Earth’s atmosphere.
• Atmosphere contains an estimated 4,000 trillion tons of N.
• Nitrogen is not a metal.
• Nitrogen gas is inert.
• French chemist Antoine Laurent Lavoisier named nitrogen azote, meaning without life.

Nitrogen is an inert gas — meaning it doesn’t chemically react with other gases — and it isn’t toxic. But breathing pure nitrogen is deadly. That’s because the gas displaces oxygen in the lungs. Unconsciousness can occur within one or two breaths, according to the U.S. Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board.

Liquid nitrogen isn’t toxic, but its extremely low temperature can cause severe damage to skin and internal organs if mishandled or consumed, the FDA said in a news release. “It may also cause burns of the fingers or hands when it is handled in the liquid state.”

It is made of nitrogen, hydrogen, and oxygen. It’s not a coincidence that many of the most famous bomb-making chemicals—nitroglycerin, nitrocellulose, trinitrotoluene (TNT), and C4 plastic—are nitrogen compounds.

nitrogen is a colourless, odourless gas that is insoluble in water. it is an unreactive gas. This is because it has a triple covalent bond between the nitrogen atoms in N 2 molecules. This strong triple bond requires substantial energy to break before the nitrogen atoms can react with other atoms.

nitrogen (N), nonmetallic element of Group 15 [Va] of the periodic table. It is a colourless, odourless, tasteless gas that is the most plentiful element in Earth’s atmosphere and is a constituent of all living matter.

Nitric oxide (NO), also called nitrogen monoxide, colourless toxic gas that is formed by the oxidation of nitrogen. Nitric oxide performs important chemical signaling functions in humans and other animals and has various applications in medicine.