NEW YORK—You’ll soon see four new names on the periodic table of the elements, including three that honor Moscow, Japan and Tennessee.
The names are among four recommended on Wednesday by an international scientific group. The fourth is named for a Russian scientist.
The International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry (IUPAC), which rules on chemical-element names, presented its proposal for public review. The names had been submitted by the element discoverers.
The four elements, known now by their numbers, completed the seventh row of the periodic table when the chemistry organization verified their discoveries last December.
Tennessee is the second US state to be recognized with an element; California was the first. Element names can come from places, mythology, names of scientists or traits of the element. Other examples: americium, einsteinium and titanium.
Joining more familiar element names, such as hydrogen, carbon and lead are:
- Moscovium—symbol Mc, for element 115, and
- Tennessine—symbol Ts, for element 117.
The discovery team of the two elements is from the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research in Dubna, Russia, the Oak Ridge National Laboratory and Vanderbilt University in Tennessee, and the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California. Vanderbilt physics Prof. Joseph Hamilton, who played a role in the discoveries, proposed naming an element for Tennessee. He had hoped to use the symbol Tn, but it had been used in the past and couldn’t be reassigned to the new element.
- Oganesson—symbol Og, for element 118. The name honors Russian physicist Yuri Oganessian.
- Nihonium—symbol Nh, for element 113. The element was discovered in Japan, and Nihon is one way to say the country’s name in Japanese. It’s the first element to be discovered in an Asian country.
An official at a Japanese institute involved in the discovery said the name was chosen to recognize government funding for the project.
“We wanted to show our research has been supported by the Japanese people,” said Kosuke Morita, a research group director at the Riken Nishina Center for Accelerator-based Science.
The team also hopes that pride and faith in science will displace the lost trust of those who suffered from the 2011 Fukushima nuclear disaster, according to IUPAC web site.
“It is a pleasure to see that specific places and names [country, state, city and scientist] related to the new elements is recognized in these four names. Although these choices may, perhaps, be viewed by some as slightly self-indulgent, the names are completely in accordance with IUPAC rules,” commented Jan Reedijk, who corresponded with the various laboratories and invited the discoverers to make proposals.
“In fact, I see it as thrilling to recognize that international collaborations were at the core of these discoveries and that these new names also make the discoveries somewhat tangible.”
The public comment period will end on November 8. Ultimately, and after the lapse of the public review, the final recommendations will be published in the IUPAC journal Pure and Applied Chemistry.
AP and IUPAC
Image credits: AP/Eugene Hoshiko