Friday, December 2, 2011

New Old Elements

When we heard the news that two new elements were about to be added to the already-difficult-to-understand periodic table, we thought immediately of this 1959 musical performance:


Following a three-year review process, an international committee of chemists and physicists first instroduced the new elements earlier this year simply as numbers 114 and 116. Now the same group of scientists has proposed to name element 114 Flerovium (Fl) in honor of physicist Georgi Flerov. Element 116 is expected to become Livermorium (Lv), named for the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in Livermore, California, where it was discovered (discarvard).

The periodic table's governing body is expected to officially endorse the names in the coming months. Even more elements, numbered 113, 115 and 188, are still under review.

Maybe it is time for some new math.