It is a silvery-white rare earth metal that is malleable, ductile and soft enough to be cut with a knife. Terbium is never found in nature as a free element. Terbium is a soft, malleable, ductile, silver-gray metal member of the lanthanide group of the periodic table. It is reasonably stable in air, but it is slowly oxidised and it reacts with cold water.
The oxide is a dark maroon or chocolate colors, atomic masses ranging from 145 to 165 are recognized. The oxide form is chocolate or dark maroon. While there are not many commercial uses for terbium, sodium terbium borate is used in solid-state devices. When combined with zirconium dioxide (ZrO2), it can act as a crystal stabilizer of elevated-temperature fuel cells. Terbium salts are used in laser devices, but otherwise this element is not widely used. Terbium is rare and expensive, so it has few commercial uses. Some minor uses are in lasers, semiconductor devices, and phosphorous in colour television tubes. It is also used in solid-state devices, as stabilizer of fuel cells which operate at high temperature. terbium compounds are encountered rarely by most people. All terbium compounds should be regarded as highly toxic although initial evidence would appear to suggest the danger is limited. Terbium compounds are skin and eye irritants. The metal dust presents a fire and explosion hazard. Terbium is used in color phosphors in lighting applications such as trichromatic lighting and in color TV tubes. It also makes the green color on your Blackberry or other high definition screen. Hybrid car engines have electric motors and all electric motors are based on magnets. These magnets need to retain their magnetism at high temperatures. Alloying neodymium with terbium and dysprosium produces such magnets. These magnets are also used in the electric motors of wind-turbines, where high temperatures are also generated.
Terbium is one of the rarer rare-earth elements, although is twice as common in the