Baku, January 1, AZERTAC
A group of Japanese researchers has been awarded the right to name the 113th element as the discoverer, research institute RIKEN said Thursday, according to Jiji Press.
The element, to be listed on the periodic table, is the first one to be named by an Asian team. The International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry granted the naming right to the group led by RIKEN scientist Kosuke Morita, who is also a professor at Kyushu University. On the periodic table, element 113 will join group 13, which also includes aluminum and boron.
The team in 2003 began an experiment to achieve the complete fusion of zinc, which has 30 protons, and bismuth, with 83 protons, by having their atomic nuclei collide in an accelerator. The team successfully synthesized a particle of the new element each in 2004, 2005 and 2012. In the third case, the synthesized particle soon underwent so-called alpha decay six times, releasing a helium nucleus with two protons each time and reducing to mendelevium with 101 protons. This was considered clear evidence of the 113th element. A joint team of Russian and U.S. researchers also claimed to have created the 113th element through a different method. But the IUPAC confirmed the Japanese team as the discoverer. The latest achievement followed an attempt to find a new element in Japan more than a century ago.
