Why it is hard to make heavier elements like oganesson ?
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Answer:
How did scientists synthesize superheavy elements like Oganesson?
Lovely question! All we need is energy and time. (and money!)
The way they synthesize superheavy elements is by slamming two elements together and hope that they stick. The maths is really easy; if you slam an atom with 2 protons into an atom having 6 protons, you get an atom with 8 protons. Easy, right? However, the problem is that usually, the number of neutrons will be insufficient hence will immediately decay before we even detect it. You can’t just slam 92 U with 83 Bi to create element 175 because the number of neutrons to hold the protons together will be so insufficient, the whole atom will just violently break apart. Hence, the first thing is to ensure that there are enough number of neutrons on the final synthesized element.
There is another problem as well. We all know that atoms have an inner core made of protons (positively charged) while the outer shell is made up of electrons (negatively charged). The nucleuses repel each other! This poses a problem because as soon as you bring them together, they will repel. So, you have to usually slam them at very high speeds to overcome this (high means close to speed of light high).
Another problem is that the nucleus is just so tiny compared to the atom! They’re so tiny that getting two of them to even meet each other is a feat by itself. An atom collider is not something you leave overnight and you see that you’ve created Og tomorrow. You usually have to leave it for months or sometimes even years.
Once you’ve overcome those above difficulties, congratulations! You have your Og. I believe they slammed Calcium-48 and Californium-249 together to create Og. Calcium-48 is a really rare isotope of Calcium and is unusually neutron-rich, so you can see why the freshly synthesized Og lasted for so long. Anyway, once you make Og, it decays almost immediately. Yes! Even if you did, how can you be so sure it is Og? You cannot directly detect Og…so how did they know that they created it in the first place?
The reason is via the detection of the byproducts of the nuclear decay and linking it with other well known nuclear decay chain. A nuclear decay chain is a chain of decay followed by an atom until it reaches stability. For example, the below is the nuclear decay chain for 238 U.
Answer:
Super-heavy elements are those with an atomic number of 100 or higher, meaning their nuclei contain 100 or more protons. ... In lighter elements, the weak nuclear force exerted by neutrons and other particles counteracts the protons' repulsive force enough to stabilize the nuclei.
" Hope it helps :) "