> Mendeleev was the first to leave gaps in his table when the next known element fit in better somewhere else, and to predict that unknown elements would fill t

> Mendeleev was the first to leave gaps in his table when the next known element fit in better somewhere else, and to predict that unknown elements would fill those gaps, and to successfully predict their properties Yes. This is a really powerful concept. By way of example, here a periodic table of data structures [0] that I think has been on HN before. The authors show that there are gaps in the arrangement they've developed, and thus predict types of data structure that haven't yet been researched. [0] https://stratos.seas.harvard.edu/files/stratos/files/periodictabledatastructures.pdf https://stratos.seas.harvard.edu/files/stratos/files/periodi...