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Science

Japan Claims Heaviest-Ever Element 59

Posted by timothy from the population-density dept.
mOoZik writes "According to People's Daily Online, Japanese scientists claim to have created a new element, whose atomic number is 113, by bombarding a Bismuth atom target with 2.5 trillion zinc atoms per second for 80 days. The claim, as that of Russian and American scientists that claimed to have created elements 113 and 115 in February, remains to be officially confirmed."
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Japan Claims Heaviest-Ever Element More

Japan Claims Heaviest-Ever Element

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  • I hope they call 155 Elerium. That would make my day in ways that are both profound and creepily geeky.

    I'm serious. We should petition whoever it is we petition for things like that.

    (I'll also note at this time that, if they actually do name it Elerium, I will make it my life's mission to start a corporation called X-Com and laugh maniacally as my alien-possessed squaddies panic and throw fusion bombs into the transport just as it lands...) /best game evar
    • Elerium is 115, not 155, but you can't have an element equal to or above 117. Or is it 147? Anybody remember or have a reference handy?

      --
      Evan

      • you can't have an element equal to or above 117. Or is it 147? Anybody remember or have a reference handy?

        Not sure where you got that, but wikipedia [wikipedia.org] seems to think that anything up to (and possibly beyond) 218 is theoretically possible. You may have been thinking of the fact that 118 is the last element that will fit on the periodic table without extending it. However, the periodic table is kind of irrelevant as far as what elements are theoretically possible since it describes only electron configurat

        • I first heard about it from Feynman who was, I think, the person who found the limit. It has to do with positions of the electrons or something to do with orbitals. Once there are a certain number of electrons, a value goes to zero or infinity.

          A bit of Googling doesn't bring it up...

          Ah! I remember - something about the electrons having to exceed c past a certain shell. Damned if I can remember the whole thing or the number. 117? 147? 217? Something like that. Turns out the number is one of the cla

        • Re:I hope I hope I hope (Score:4, Informative)

          by JabberWokky ( 19442 ) <slashdot.com@timewarp.org> on Wednesday September 29, 2004 @07:26PM (#10389761) Homepage Journal
          Found a fairly clear explanation on this web page [reciprocalsystem.com]:

          For the reasons previously given, the limiting value, the equivalent of zero in each scalar dimension, is eight units of one-dimensional, or four units of two-dimensional, rotational displacement. In the notation used herein, the latter is a 4-4 magnetic combination. However, as indicated in Chapter 24, the destructive limit is not reached until the displacement in the electric dimension also arrives at the equivalent of the last magnetic unit. A rotational combination (atom) is therefore stable, at zero magnetic ionization, up to 4-4-31, or the equivalent 5-4-(1), which is element 117. One more step reaches the limit at which the rotational motion terminates.

          --
          Evan

          • The text you quoted, the text you mot modded up for, looks like total bafflegab to me. Not only does it look like bafflegab, but it includes apparently absurd claims such as element 117 reaching some sort of limit where "rotational motion terminates". That simply does not make any sense at all under known physics. Ok, so we are taking about some pretty radical hitherto unknown physics.

            So lets take a look at your Reciprocal Systems [reciprocalsystem.com] link and the theory behind it. It contains pages and pages of rather dense d
            • Whups - that comes from reading a single paragraph and not the entire site. I could blame Google, but Google is a tool; I misused it by not verifying the whole source and not passing it by my SO (while I am not a working scientist, she is).

              I *do* have a significantly better reference, but it is dead tree and possibly out of date. "Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman!" [amazon.com] contains information about it toward the end of the book. Having recently moved, most of my books are boxed up, or I would post an excerpt.

  • Mass (Score:5, Informative)

    by vijaya_chandra ( 618284 ) on Wednesday September 29, 2004 @03:04PM (#10387164)
    The element's atomic mass number is 278, meaning its nucleus has 113 protons and 165 neutrons, he added.

    For the lazy ppl who wouldn't have time to go through the article.

    Quite surprising to see a mentioning of the atomic mass number only as the last sentence of the article, as this, and not the atomic number, actually decides whether this new element is the heaviest or not.

  • No, no. (Score:2, Funny)

    by scowling ( 215030 )
    The heaviest element I've ever encountered would be my dad's synthesis of potroastium.

  • According to South Park... (Score:4, Funny)

    by Universal Nerd ( 579391 ) on Wednesday September 29, 2004 @03:12PM (#10387301)
    They already beat the US in building a ladder to heaven, now they're trying to beat the US in building a heavier element!

  • Whoah! (Score:4, Interesting)

    by vijaya_chandra ( 618284 ) on Wednesday September 29, 2004 @03:14PM (#10387328)
    ... the cyclotron bombarded a bismuth atom target with 2.5 trillion zinc atoms per second for 80 days, the scientist said, the team found the new element, which disintegrated in only 0.3 millisecond.

    That's 80*24*60*60 * 2.5 * 10^10 (bc says 1.728 * 10^17, which isn't quite comparable to the avogadro or whatever number, but is still quite impressive) atoms to get this new element that disintegrated in 0.0003 seconds

    and here I am, cursing myself and the world if I have to rewrite a stupid, tiny class.

  • Suggested name: Pokemonium (Score:1, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Dendrobium?

  • Bombarding? Bismuth? (Score:2, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward

    Oh man, seeing those two words together brings back a bad memory. I had been drinking really heavily one night, see? (Well, heavily for a nerd). And I was feeling pretty drunk and I thought I was going to toss my cookies bad. But there were some really sexy girls at this party and I didn't want to leave. So in my drunken state I drank some of this cheap Pepto-Bismol knockoff called Pink Bismuth [drugstore.com], thinking it would settle my tummy. So I go back out to the main room and party like nothing happened and I'

    • For more information on pepto bismol, look it up on E2. I did a cool wwriteup over there :) I'm not going to link it though, in the hopes that they won't get slashdotted or anything.
  • ...stupid stuff we did as kids?

    "bombarding a Bismuth atom target with 2.5 trillion zinc atoms per second for 80 days"

    ants and magnifying glass, M&M's shaken-up in a bottle of soda, etc.

  • Japonium? (Score:2, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward
    You'd think they'd pick a different name like nipponium or japanium. Mark this flamebait if you must, but in my opinion, this would be like Nigerian scientists naming it nigonium.
    • Gee this is hardly news... I have know for something more than 20 years that one of Japans best robots,Mazinger-Z is made of that material. Check it out. carnage.fanfic.org/mazingerz.html

  • mass not weight (Score:2, Informative)

    by grishknash ( 118043 )
    Its mass not weight. Its the most massive atom not the heaviest. The heaviest is near some black hole in the highest gravitational field currently unknown to man. Not quite sure how Einstein would state it. Something about its acceleration in the bending of the spacetime in that location....
  • Looking over at my periodic table on the wall and low i see more than 112, my table goes to 118 but misses the odd #'s over 112. I thought that 116 (ununhexium) was the most massive element and then they missed 114 (ununquadium) as well.

    I am not sure if 116 or 114 are "confirmed" but 116 is fairly reproducible and the article states that japans 113 is not yet "confirmed" so that would but it on par with these others. As a note 118 was reported by a Russian but was later retracted due to reproducibility

  • The heaviest element (Score:5, Funny)

    by Muhammar ( 659468 ) on Wednesday September 29, 2004 @08:56PM (#10390372)
    "The heaviest element known to science was recently discovered at Turgid University. Tentatively named administratium, element has no protons or electrons. It has one neutron, 125 assistant neutrons, 75 vice neutrons and 111 assistant vice neutrons. These 312 particles are held together by a force that involves exchange of strong-interacting particles, so-called morons.

    Administratium has half-life of approximately three years but it does not decay. Instead it undergoes a reorganization in which assistant neutrons, vice neutrons and assistant vice neutrons exchange places. (Some studies suggest that the total mass actually increases after each reorganization.)

    Administratium is inert. However, it can be detected as it impedes every reaction it comes in contact with. A minute amount of administratium causes reactions to take over four days to complete when it would have normally occurred in less than a second.
  • I was going to suggest they name the new element Nipponium but the chemical symbols Ni (Nickel) and Np (Neptunium) are already taken, so perhaps Sakium (Sa), their national drink.
  • I am disappointed that the Japanese scientists stooped to the stereotypical and politically incorrect "Japonium."

    I think that the culturally reflective and historically pensive "Godzilium" or "Rodanium" would be more chic, 'moderne,' and appropriate. (Although I do like the previously mentioned "Pokemonium.")

    Perhaps they would also consider "Karaokenium" or "Mystiethreekaynium" ...

  • ... 2.5 trillion zinc atoms per second for 80 days.

    2.5 x 10^12 * 60 * 60 * 24 * 80 = 1.728 x 10^19 atoms. A mole of zinc masses in at 65.409g, and we have 28.7 micromols of zinc.

    All of the zinc used massed in at a whopping 2 mg!!!

  • If Japan has made the heaviest element, then it must of course be named Sumomium!

    Thank you, I'm here all week.

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