Synthetic element

A synthetic element is a chemical element that does not occur naturally on Earth. Humans create these elements by manipulating fundamental particles. Scientists use tools like nuclear reactors or particle accelerators to achieve this. They can also use the energy from an atomic bomb explosion. Because they are made by humans, they are often called artificial or man-made.

The creation of a synthetic element requires a specific process. Scientists take an existing element with a low atomic number. The atomic number is the total count of protons in a nucleus. To make a new element, they must force additional protons into that nucleus. This can happen through nuclear fusion or neutron absorption. By adding these particles, the identity of the atom changes. This process turns one element into a completely different one.

There are 24 elements that are strictly synthetic. These elements have atomic numbers ranging from 95 to 118. They were all first created between the years 1944 and 2010. Some other elements are sometimes called synthetic, but they are slightly different. For example, technetium, promethium, astatine, neptunium, and plutonium were made by humans first. However, scientists later found them in tiny trace quantities in nature. Plutonium is the element with the highest atomic number found in nature. It is used in nuclear reactors and atomic bombs.

All known synthetic elements are unstable. This means they undergo radioactive decay. During decay, they turn into lighter elements. These elements have different half-lives, which is the time it takes for half of them to decay. Some isotopes have very long half-lives, lasting millions of years. Others are extremely short-lived, lasting only microseconds. For instance, Curium-247 has a half-life of 1.64 × 10^7 years. In contrast, Bohrium-270 has a half-life of only about 61 seconds.

The history of these elements began in 1937 with technetium. This was the first element to be synthesized rather than discovered in nature. Technetium filled a gap in the periodic table. In 1944, Glenn T. Seaborg, Ralph A. James, and Albert Ghiorso created curium. They synthesized it by bombarding plutonium with alpha particles. Curium was the first entirely synthetic element ever made. Later, in 1952, a team led by Albert Ghiorso discovered einsteinium and fermium. They found these elements while studying debris from a hydrogen bomb detonation.

During the Cold War, scientific competition was very high. Teams from the United States and the Soviet Union worked independently. They both created the elements rutherfordium and dubnium. For many years, the credit for these discoveries was not resolved. In 1992, international organizations finally recognized shared credit for both. In 1997, the name dubnium was chosen to honor the Russian city of Dubna. This was done because American names had already been used for other elements. The name rutherfordium was accepted for element 104.

Modern discovery involves many different countries. An American team created seaborgium. A German team created six elements, including bohrium and meitnerium. A Japanese team created element 113, known as nihonium. The final five elements were created by Russian-American collaborations. These include flerovium, moscovium, livermorium, tennessine, and oganesson. These elements complete the seventh row of the periodic table. Most elements with atomic numbers greater than 99 are used only for scientific research. They decay too quickly to be produced in large quantities for other uses.