Fermium
⚛️ In Your World
Fermium is a purely synthetic element that has never been produced in large enough quantities to be seen with the naked eye. All of its isotopes are intensely radioactive with very short half-lives. As such, it has no applications outside of fundamental scientific research. It is primarily of interest to scientists studying the properties of heavy elements and the limits of the periodic table.
📖 The Discovery Story
Like its neighbor einsteinium, fermium was discovered in 1952 in the radioactive debris from the "Ivy Mike" hydrogen bomb test. A team of scientists led by Albert Ghiorso at the University of California, Berkeley, identified the new element. The discovery was kept classified until 1955. The element was named "fermium" in honor of Enrico Fermi, one of the pioneers of the nuclear age and the architect of the first self-sustaining nuclear chain reaction.
📊 Properties at a Glance
| Phase at STP | Solid (presumed) |
| Melting Point | 1527 °C / 2781 °F (predicted) |
| Boiling Point | Unknown |
| Electron Configuration | [Rn] 5f¹²7s² |
| Abundance in Earth's Crust | Essentially zero |
⚠️ Safety & Handling
Fermium is intensely radioactive and extremely hazardous. It has only ever been produced in nanogram quantities (billionths of a gram) and its properties have been studied on an atom-by-atom basis. All work with fermium is conducted in specialized hot cells with remote manipulators to protect researchers from its lethal radiation.