In honor of the Nobel prizes being awarded this past week, I
have decided to cover Nobelium. This element was named after Alfred Nobel, who
is the creator of dynamite and is also the man who created/funded the
prestigious Nobel prizes.
Nobelium is a
synthetic and radioactive metal, with the atomic number of 102. Its atomic
weight is believed to be 259,its melting point is 827 degrees Celcius, and its
boiling point is unknown.
Nobelium
has been a finicky element to
isolate. A group in Sweden in 1957 claimed to have discovered an element, which
they named Nobelium. It is surprising that element 102 kept the same name
because this research had been determined faulty. The credit for the actual
discovery of element 102 was given to a research group at the University of Berkely
, who researhced from 1958–1964, in 1966. This group decided to retain the name
honoring Alfred Nobel.
There
are no truly stable isotopes of Nobelium. The most stable isotope of Nobelium, Nobelium-259,
has a half-life
of approximately 58 minutes. Only infinitesimal amounts of Nobelium have ever
been produced, there are no uses of it outside of scientific research.
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