»Gallium
~ a soft silvery metallic poor metal, a brittle solid at low temperatures, liquefies slightly above room temperature, melts in the hand
~ occurs in trace amounts in bauxite and zinc ores
~ in the compounds gallium nitride and gallium arsenide used as a semiconductor, most notably in LEDs
~ gallium metal expands by 3.1 percent when it solidifies, and therefore storage in either glass or metal containers is avoided
~ due to the possibility of container rupture with freezing
~ it shares the higher-density liquid state with only a few materials like germanium, bismuth, antimony and water
~ attacks most other metals by diffusing into their metal lattice
~ easily alloys with many metals
~ the melting point temperature of 30°C allows the metal to be melted in one's hand
~ is one of the metals with caesium, rubidium, francium and mercury which are liquid at or near normal room temperature
~ liquid gallium metal wets glass and skin, making it mechanically more difficult to handle even though it is substantially less toxic and requires far fewer precautions
~ for above reasons samples of gallium metal are usually supplied in polyethylene packets within other containers

As part of an energy storage mechanism:
~ Aluminium is reactive enough to reduce water to hydrogen, being oxidized to aluminium oxide
~ the aluminium oxide forms a protective coat which prevents further reaction
~ when Ga is alloyed with aluminium Al, the coat does not form
~ the Ga Al alloy can potentially provide a solid hydrogen source
~ resmelting the resultant aluminum oxide and gallium mixture to metallic aluminum and gallium and
~ reforming these into electrodes would constitute most of the energy input into the system,
~ while electricity produced by a hydrogen fuel cell could constitute an energy output
~ the thermodynamic efficiency of the aluminum smelting process is said to be approximately 50 percent
~ therefore, at most no more than half the energy that goes into smelting aluminum could be recovered by a fuel cell