4 ms·

TL;DR: accelerating titanium ions to 0.1 c into a plutonium target made 2 atoms of Livermorium. The difficulty here is that such a collision leaves the result

TL;DR: accelerating titanium ions to 0.1 c into a plutonium target made 2 atoms of Livermorium. The difficulty here is that such a collision leaves the result very "hot", so it tends to decompose. This tendency is minimized by reducing the energy of the incoming ion, but that reduces the rate of fusion. Needless to say, this doesn't present much in the way of practical benefit from producing some new science fictional material. It's purely of scientific interest.

eichin 2y ago
Key point I missed: Livermorium here is just a benchmark for the new titanium-beam process (having been discovered in 2000.) Actually using it to attempt to produce element 120 is a future step.
- pfdietz 2y ago
  Yes; they had to demonstrate they could form and accelerate titanium beams (made difficult by the high temperature needed to sufficiently vaporize titanium.)
  - eichin 2y ago
    Heh, the materials science side of particle physics is all sorts of fun: accelerate the particles to 10% of the speed of light - no big deal, but actually vaporizing them in the first place...
    - ForOldHack 2y ago
      Pita is relative. Getting Ti to oxidize? Easy - getting it got enough to strip the oxigen off? Very hard, and about 1000x harder than just oxidize, getting it into a pure plasma? Now this is where it just gets insane. Then beyond insane is accelerating individual atoms. ( Pretty much they just issue you a PhD. ) Then get it to .1c speed? Pretty much everyone you will talk to on a daily basis either has a Noble, or is goimg to get one, in a place where the building is named after one laureat, the parking lot is named for another, the room another, and the drinking fountain another. I have stood there, and it's pretty intimidating. A handful of the very top top people in the world. I guess it could be fun for some...I would use the verb... Plasmatize. The discovery of Fluorine...elemental, killed 8 and rendered 3 disabled. I have been following this for 40 years. Congratulations on the attempt.
  - qwezxcrty 2y ago
    Not sure that is actually the difficult part. For these low vapor pressure elements one can use a sputtering ion source...
beerandt 2y ago
The tangent on manipulating Titanium in order to prepare it for the beam was more interesting to me, and IMHO sounds like a much more practical and potentially useful bit of knowledge coming from this. Titanium is a pita to work with. But also... the 'island of stability' is fascinating, and I think we have to assume that we don't know enough about the Strong Force until we either prove it exists and is reachable, or doesn't/isn't.
- pfdietz 2y ago
  The problem with the strong force is that it doesn't have some nice tidy description, like the inverse square law for the electrostatic force. It's spin dependent, and not just involving interactions of pairs of nucleons. There are at least three-nucleon terms in the potential. It looks like something accidental, not elegant or designed. It just "happens" to give stable nuclei that end up allowing something like us to have come into existence. I get the feeling of anthropic effects on display.
  - jcghgxt 2y ago
    I don't get this. Do nucleons bind and hold together because of the strong force or gravity? I thought strong force only keeps quarks together via gluon exchange
    - pfdietz 2y ago
      Nucleons in nuclei are bound by the strong force. It's (vaguely) analogous to the way the electromagnetic force still binds neutral molecules together (van der Waals force). At the scale of the nucleus, gravity is many, MANY orders of magnitude weaker.
AmericanChopper 2y ago
Genuinely want to know, what is the scientific interest here? The synthesis of super heavy elements always seems to be the same story, they detect its presence for a tiny fraction of a second, and then it decays away. What is learnt from doing this?
- vikramkr 2y ago
  Well, I'm sure there's all sorts of interesting nuclear physics to be learned like island of stability stuff, but given the context of who's doing this work and competing for credit - I guess even out of the cold war context it's a great way to show that 1) my country is better than your country at nuclear physics get rekt or 2) my country and your country get along now, look at us do nuclear physics together or 3) what's up, new player here, btw I'm also good at nuclear physics check out this element I found. Or in this case 4) oh no your country and my country don't get along anymore! time to asset scientific dominance by "re entering the super heavy race" (https://www.science.org/content/article/u-s-back-race-forge-unknown-superheavy-elements https://www.science.org/content/article/u-s-back-race-forge-...) and getting the department of energy to start funding this again so we're back on top.
  - ForOldHack 2y ago
    Seriously: this is one of the very most important topics in physics today. It is not written of discussed nearly enough. My father was part of an international team, ignored in the U.S. and worshipped internationally. I would assign the noun- royal pita. I read every article I come across about this, and I would strongly encourage you to write more. What upsets me is politics getting in the way of science.
    - AmericanChopper 2y ago
      I'm not sure I get what you're saying here. Competing with Russians over heavy element synthesis is one of the very most important topics in physics today? What is the actual scientific value of the research, what do we learn from it? Is it just that one day we might find a stable element?
mihaaly 2y ago
... so basically overgrown childrens' play with expensive toys?
- pfdietz 2y ago
  I think there's a bit of institutional momentum here, along with the historical realization that "finding new elements" was really valuable in the past (not that these new elements would be valuable). There's also a bit of international competition.

eichin 2y ago

Key point I missed: Livermorium here is just a benchmark for the new titanium-beam process (having been discovered in 2000.) Actually using it to attempt to produce element 120 is a future step.

pfdietz 2y ago
Yes; they had to demonstrate they could form and accelerate titanium beams (made difficult by the high temperature needed to sufficiently vaporize titanium.)
- eichin 2y ago
  Heh, the materials science side of particle physics is all sorts of fun: accelerate the particles to 10% of the speed of light - no big deal, but actually vaporizing them in the first place...
  - ForOldHack 2y ago
    Pita is relative. Getting Ti to oxidize? Easy - getting it got enough to strip the oxigen off? Very hard, and about 1000x harder than just oxidize, getting it into a pure plasma? Now this is where it just gets insane. Then beyond insane is accelerating individual atoms. ( Pretty much they just issue you a PhD. ) Then get it to .1c speed? Pretty much everyone you will talk to on a daily basis either has a Noble, or is goimg to get one, in a place where the building is named after one laureat, the parking lot is named for another, the room another, and the drinking fountain another. I have stood there, and it's pretty intimidating. A handful of the very top top people in the world. I guess it could be fun for some...I would use the verb... Plasmatize. The discovery of Fluorine...elemental, killed 8 and rendered 3 disabled. I have been following this for 40 years. Congratulations on the attempt.
- qwezxcrty 2y ago
  Not sure that is actually the difficult part. For these low vapor pressure elements one can use a sputtering ion source...

beerandt 2y ago

The tangent on manipulating Titanium in order to prepare it for the beam was more interesting to me, and IMHO sounds like a much more practical and potentially useful bit of knowledge coming from this. Titanium is a pita to work with. But also... the 'island of stability' is fascinating, and I think we have to assume that we don't know enough about the Strong Force until we either prove it exists and is reachable, or doesn't/isn't.

pfdietz 2y ago
The problem with the strong force is that it doesn't have some nice tidy description, like the inverse square law for the electrostatic force. It's spin dependent, and not just involving interactions of pairs of nucleons. There are at least three-nucleon terms in the potential. It looks like something accidental, not elegant or designed. It just "happens" to give stable nuclei that end up allowing something like us to have come into existence. I get the feeling of anthropic effects on display.
- jcghgxt 2y ago
  I don't get this. Do nucleons bind and hold together because of the strong force or gravity? I thought strong force only keeps quarks together via gluon exchange
  - pfdietz 2y ago
    Nucleons in nuclei are bound by the strong force. It's (vaguely) analogous to the way the electromagnetic force still binds neutral molecules together (van der Waals force). At the scale of the nucleus, gravity is many, MANY orders of magnitude weaker.

AmericanChopper 2y ago

Genuinely want to know, what is the scientific interest here? The synthesis of super heavy elements always seems to be the same story, they detect its presence for a tiny fraction of a second, and then it decays away. What is learnt from doing this?

vikramkr 2y ago
Well, I'm sure there's all sorts of interesting nuclear physics to be learned like island of stability stuff, but given the context of who's doing this work and competing for credit - I guess even out of the cold war context it's a great way to show that 1) my country is better than your country at nuclear physics get rekt or 2) my country and your country get along now, look at us do nuclear physics together or 3) what's up, new player here, btw I'm also good at nuclear physics check out this element I found. Or in this case 4) oh no your country and my country don't get along anymore! time to asset scientific dominance by "re entering the super heavy race" (https://www.science.org/content/article/u-s-back-race-forge-unknown-superheavy-elements https://www.science.org/content/article/u-s-back-race-forge-...) and getting the department of energy to start funding this again so we're back on top.
- ForOldHack 2y ago
  Seriously: this is one of the very most important topics in physics today. It is not written of discussed nearly enough. My father was part of an international team, ignored in the U.S. and worshipped internationally. I would assign the noun- royal pita. I read every article I come across about this, and I would strongly encourage you to write more. What upsets me is politics getting in the way of science.
  - AmericanChopper 2y ago
    I'm not sure I get what you're saying here. Competing with Russians over heavy element synthesis is one of the very most important topics in physics today? What is the actual scientific value of the research, what do we learn from it? Is it just that one day we might find a stable element?

mihaaly 2y ago

... so basically overgrown childrens' play with expensive toys?

pfdietz 2y ago
I think there's a bit of institutional momentum here, along with the historical realization that "finding new elements" was really valuable in the past (not that these new elements would be valuable). There's also a bit of international competition.