Moscovium
Moscovium is a synthetic superheavy element in group 15, below bismuth, created by an international collaboration firing calcium nuclei at an americium target. It's named after Moscow Oblast, the region of Russia home to the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research where it was synthesized. No atom of moscovium has ever survived longer than a fraction of a second.
- Group · Period
- 15 · 7
- At room temp
- solid
- Melts at
- Not yet available
- Density
- Not yet available
- Discovered
- 2003
Uses
Moscovium has no practical, industrial or medical use of any kind, and given the extraordinary difficulty of producing even a single atom, it never will. Its value is entirely scientific — each atom detected helps researchers refine theories of nuclear structure and probe the boundary of the periodic table.
History
Moscovium was first synthesized in 2003 by a collaboration between the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research in Dubna, Russia, and Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in the United States, who fused an accelerated beam of calcium nuclei with a target made of americium. It was named moscovium after the Moscow region of Russia, honoring the location of the Dubna laboratory. The name was formally adopted by the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry in 2016.
Fun facts
- Moscovium is named after the Moscow region of Russia, home to the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research where it was first produced.
- Moscovium was made by fusing calcium and americium nuclei — meaning its creation required first making americium, itself an artificial element produced in nuclear reactors.
- Only a small number of moscovium atoms — likely well under a hundred in total — are thought to have ever been created across all experiments to date.
Frequently asked questions
Does moscovium have any real-world use?
No — moscovium has no commercial, industrial or medical applications. It exists purely as a subject of nuclear physics research, produced one atom at a time.
How is moscovium made?
Moscovium is produced by accelerating a specially prepared, rare isotope of calcium and firing it at a target of americium, another artificial element, so that the nuclei occasionally fuse together. Physicists confirm each new atom through the specific chain of radioactive decays it produces.
Why does moscovium decay so fast?
Its nucleus crams an enormous number of protons together, and the electrical repulsion between them makes the nucleus fundamentally unstable. Moscovium's known isotopes fall apart through radioactive decay in well under a second.
Isotopes
4 known isotopes
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| Isotope | Natural abundance | Half-life | Decay mode | Mass excess | Binding energy / nucleon | Decay width |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Mc-288 | — | 0.17 s | Alpha decay (100%) | 179,666 keV | 7,135 keV | 2.68 × 10-15 eV |
| Mc-289 | — | 296 ms | Alpha decay (100%), Spontaneous fission (5%) | 180,683 keV | 7,135 keV | 1.54 × 10-15 eV |
| Mc-290 | — | 0.65 s | Alpha decay (100%), Spontaneous fission | 182,792 keV | 7,131 keV | 7.02 × 10-16 eV |
Show all 4 isotopes
| Mc-287 | — | 37 ms | Alpha decay (100%), Spontaneous fission (25%) | 177,748 keV | 7,139 keV | 1.23 × 10-14 eV |