Mendelevium
Mendelevium was the ninth synthetic transuranium element of
the actinide series to be discovered.
It was first identified by Albert Ghiorso, Bernard Harvey,
Gregory Choppin, Stanley Thompson, and Glenn Seaborg in
1955 at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, California.
Mendelevium-256 (half-life 78.1 minutes) was produced by
bombarding einsteinium-253 with alpha particles in the
Berkeley 60-inch cyclotron.
Only 17 atoms of mendelevium-256 were initially produced in
an all night experiment predicted to produce just one or two
atoms of product every three hours. Each nuclear reaction
created mendelevium-256 and a neutron.
Mendelevium was identified by chemical analysis in an ion
exchange experiment.
The element is named after the Russian chemist Dmitri
Mendeleev who devised the first periodic table in modern form.
Appearance and characteristics
Harmful effects:
Mendelevium is harmful due to its radioactivity.
Characteristics:
Mendelevium is a synthetic, highly radioactive metal and has
only been produced in miniscule amounts.
Mendelevium was the first element to be produced one atom at
a time.
Mendelevium metal has not been prepared.
Source: Mendelevium is a synthetic element and is not found
naturally. Mendelevium is produced through charged-particle of
lighter elements in particle accelerators.
Nobelium
Research scientists at the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research
in Dubna, Russia synthesized nobelium for the first time in
1966.
The element was given its name in honor of Alfred Nobel.
‘Nobelium’ had actually been proposed as the element 102’s
name in 1957, by scientists from the Nobel Institute of Physics
in Sweden who believed they had produced it. Further
investigations ruled out the possibility they had made
nobelium.
A stronger claim to have made nobelium was made in 1958 by
scientists at the University of California, Berkeley.
After reviewing all claims IUPAC (International Union of Pure
and Applied Chemistry) ruled that the discovery was most
likely to have been made in Dubna in 1966.
Appearance and characteristics
Harmful effects:
Nobelium is harmful due to its radioactivity.
Characteristics:
Nobelium is a synthetic, highly radioactive metal that has only
been produced in miniscule amounts.
Nobelium is normally a divalent ion in aqueous solution.
Source: Nobelium is a synthetic element and is not found
naturally.
Nobelium is created by nuclear bombardment, and has only
been produced in miniscule amounts. Nobelium can be
produced by irradiating a californium-249 target with carbon-12
ions.
Lawrencium
Lawrencium was synthesized in 1961 by Albert Ghiorso,
Torbjørn Sikkeland, Almon Larsh and Robert Latimer at the
Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, California.
It was the last member of the actinide series to be discovered.
A heavy-ion linear accelerator (HILAC) was used to bombard a
3 milligram target of californium (consisting of a mixture of
californium isotopes of mass number 249, 250, 251, and 252)
with boron-10 and boron-11 ions, producing lawrencium.
The target consisted of a mixture of californium isotopes and
therefore an exact mass of the new element could not be
assigned. Later research suggested that lawrencium-258 (half-
life 4.2 seconds) was produced in the 1961 experiment.
The element was named after Ernest Lawrence, inventor of the
cyclotron particle accelerator.
The symbol Lw was used originally, but in 1963 this was
changed by The International Union of Pure and Applied
Chemistry (IUPAC) to Lr.
Appearance and characteristics
Harmful effects:
Lawrencium is harmful due to its radioactivity.
Characteristics:
Lawrencium is a synthetic, highly radioactive metal that has
only been produced in miniscule amounts.
Lawrencium is a trivalent ion in aqueous solution.
Lawrencium metal has not been prepared.
All of its isotopes are short-lived. Its longest lived isotopes
is 262Lr with a half-life of 216 minutes.
