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Barium is one of the, is the heaviest stable alkaline earth, that is Group 2, the same
one as magnesium and beryllium and so, I believe, though it wasn't labelled when I picked it
up in the ground, that this is an example of barium sulphate. It is a very heavy mineral
and barium absorbs x-rays quite strongly, so when people are ill and the doctors need
to x-ray their insides, you can’t look at the inside of somebody’s stomach or throat
easily by x-rays but if you give them a drink of barium which is called a Barium Meal or
a Barium Enema depending on which hole you put it in, then the tube or the gut becomes
opaque to the x-rays and so then you can image them quite easily and if there is some nasty
hole or something then it appears much more easily.