A New Element

[drplokta]

This (gacked from Slashdot) is an astonishing story, if true. The first element discovered (as opposed to created, or found in nature after first having been created) since 1939. And they think it has atomic number 122 and a half-life of over 100 million years. Poul Anderson was right all along.

Comments

[erikvolson.livejournal.com]

Amazing, indeed -- well outside the previously theorized "island of stability" centered around eka-Pb/Uuq (114), not eka-Rf.

http://arxivblog.com/?p=385

[minnehaha.livejournal.com]

Page seems to have been killed by the SlashDot effect.

B

Re: http://arxivblog.com/?p=385

[minnehaha.livejournal.com]

No; wait.

It just takes forever to load.

B

Re: http://arxivblog.com/?p=385

[drplokta]

So it does. Quick precis: international team of scientists go looking for transuranics occurring naturally (in quantities of a few atoms) in thorium, and think they've found one.

[purplecthulhu.livejournal.com]

You beat me to it!

I would note that this paper has yet to be accepted for publication, so these results have to be treated with caution, but it is very interesting news if true.

[watervole.livejournal.com]

Fascinating!

I've not read that particular book, what did Anderson predict?

[drplokta]

It's about the discovery of a planet that just survived a nearby supernova explosion, and therefore has deposits of superheavy elements in the island of stability which can be commercially exploited.

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

Bloody hell. Must have come in as a micrometeorite or something.