Oganesson
⚛️ In Your World
Oganesson is a synthetic, superheavy element that has only ever been created a few atoms at a time in particle accelerators. Its most stable known isotope, oganesson-294, has a half-life of less than a millisecond. Due to its extreme instability and the fact that only a handful of atoms have ever been made, it has no applications outside of fundamental scientific research. Its only purpose is to help scientists understand the behavior and limits of atomic nuclei.
📖 The Discovery Story
Oganesson was first successfully synthesized in 2006 by a joint team of Russian scientists at the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research (JINR) in Dubna, and American scientists at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL). The team, led by physicist Yuri Oganessian, produced oganesson by bombarding a target of californium-249 with accelerated calcium-48 ions. The element was officially named in 2016 in honor of Yuri Oganessian for his pioneering research into superheavy elements, making him the only living person to have an element named after them at the time.
📊 Properties at a Glance
| Phase at STP | Solid (predicted) |
| Melting Point | ~325 K (52 °C, 125 °F) (predicted) |
| Boiling Point | ~450 K (177 °C, 350 °F) (predicted) |
| Electron Configuration | [Rn] 5f¹⁴6d¹⁰7s²7p⁶ (predicted) |
| Abundance in Earth's Crust | Essentially zero |
⚠️ Safety & Handling
Oganesson is intensely radioactive and extremely hazardous. It has only ever been produced on an atom-by-atom basis. All work with oganesson is conducted in specialized particle accelerator facilities with remote handling to protect researchers from its lethal radiation.