Descubren el elmenton 114

The scientists at the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research in Dubna, Russia reported discovery of element 114 back in 1999, but production of an element has to be verified before it can be officially 'discovered'. Physics Today reports that researchers at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory have confirmed the Russian results.

The Berkeley team fired a beam of calcium-48 ions at a target containing plutonium-242. A gas-filled mass spectrometer was used to analyze the reaction products, which included two decay chains which correlate as originating as ²⁸⁶114 and ²⁸⁷114. The procedure and results used by the Berkeley team are similar to those of the Dubna team, though the two groups obtained slightly different cross sections. The lower cross section observed by the Berkeley team could be a statistical variation or could be the result of some of the 114 nuclei overshooting the detector.