Periodic table gets a new element

[IndianaGreen]

Page last updated at 17:01 GMT, Wednesday, 10 June 2009 18:01 UK

Periodic table gets a new element

By Victoria Gill

Science reporter, BBC News

The ubiquitous periodic table will soon have a new addition - the "super-heavy" element 112.

More than a decade after experiments first produced a single atom of the element, a team of German scientists has been credited with its discovery.

The team, led by Sigurd Hofmann at the Centre for Heavy Ion Research, must propose a name for their find, before it can be formally added to the table.

Scientists continue the race to discover more super-heavy elements.

Professor Hofmann began his quest to add to the periodic table in 1976.

The fusion experiments he and his colleagues carried out at the centre have already revealed the existence of elements with atomic numbers 107-111.

These are known as "super-heavy elements" - their numbers represent the number of protons which, together with neutrons, give the atom the vast majority of its mass.

To create element 112, Professor Hofmann's team used a 120m-long particle accelerator to fire a beam of charged zinc atoms (or zinc ions) at lead atoms. Nuclei of the two elements merged, or fused, to form the nucleus of the new element.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/8093374.stm

[ZombieHorde]

1. Cool.

I read http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=228&topic_id=52802&mesg_id=52803">here that exposure to just small amounts of this new element will give the exposed intense cannibalistic urges.

K&R

[NYC_SKP]

2. Um, corrected link to cannibalism here:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=228&topic_id=52802&mesg_id=52805

Maybe it's replicating. :P

[rpannier]

3. Thanks for sharing

I find this stuff really interesting, though I don't always understand everything about it.

It's also a hell of a lot more interesting than the "I'm done with Obama" threads that get 1000 replies and 500 recs.

[Orsino]

4. "Created," rather than discovered...

...but I get the use of the term. We might prefer to call it "confirming the periodic model of Atomic Theory."