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Moreover, in a paper published in April, Hemley and his colleagues report signs that hydrogen squeezed up to 360 GPa holds on to its diatomic character and fails to morph into a monatomic metal.

Its ratio of specific heats has very nearly the ideal value 1.666, appropriate to a monatomic molecule.

The same value had previously been found for mercury vapour by Kundt and Warburg, and had been regarded as confirmatory of the monatomic character attributed on chemical grounds to the mercury molecule.

The molecule of iodine, for example, is monatomic at 1200� C., but becomes diatomic at the ordinary temperature.

The supporters of the formula Hg2Cl2 pointed out that dissociation into mercury and mercuric chloride would give this value, since mercury is a monatomic element.