Islands of Stability in the Periodic Table

Filed under "Mike would have loved this." Way back, way /way/ back, talking high school or so, friend Mike first mentioned research he'd read about talking about islands of stability - super-heavy elements that, unlike most elements heavier than plutonium, were stable for more than a few fractions of a second.

Apparently researchers at Lawrence Berkeley are getting closer. They've apparently made element 114, which hung around for a tenth of a second.

Mike had a lot of ideas about the properties of elements from the island of stability, but I sha'ant put his high-school era science to the test posthumously, and I don't recall them clearly anyway. It's possible he was making them up for gaming purposes anyway.

Anyway, the full article is here, linked from Portal to the Universe

-JRS