coltan

See also: Coltan

English
A piece of columbite-tantalite or coltan.

Etymology

Blend of columbite +‎ tantalite.

Noun

coltan (plural coltans)

  1. A metallic ore from which the elements niobium and tantalum are extracted.
    Synonym: columbite-tantalite
    Coltan is used for the production of tantalum capacitors.
    • 2014, Adam Schatz, ‘Ça va un peu’, London Review of Books, vol. 36 no. 20:
      Consider your mobile phone. Before it was assembled in a Chinese factory, the coltan in its capacitors may have been dug by miners in the Eastern Congo, where millions have died in a series of wars over ‘conflict minerals’, though we give this no more thought than previous generations of Westerners gave to the Congolese origins of the ivory in their piano keys, the rubber in their tyres, the copper in their bullet casings or the uranium in their bombs.

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Spanish

Noun

coltan m (uncountable)

  1. coltan
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