Now Introducing Element 114 to the Periodic Table

Russian scientists have created element 114 and, true to predictions, it is more stable than those immediately before it in the periodic table, according to a news report in the Jan. 22 Science. Physicists at the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research in Dubna shot ions of calcium-48 at plutonium-244 to produce the new element, which has a molecular weight of 289.

The new element decays with a half-life of 30 seconds into element 112 which, by contrast, has a half-life of only 28 milliseconds. Element 113 has not been created yet.

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Compiled by Times medical writer Thomas H. Maugh II