Livermorium (Lv)

Livermorium is named for Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California, whose actinide chemists supplied the exotic curium targets that Dubna's accelerator needed — most of the elements from 114 to 118 were a joint effort in which Russia provided the beam and America provided the target. The first atoms were made in July 2000 by firing calcium-48 at curium-248. Everything about its chemistry is prediction: it sits below polonium and is expected to be metallic, but nobody has had two atoms at once to test it with.

Properties

Atomic number

116

Symbol

Lv

Mass number of most stable isotope

[293]

Category

Post-transition metal

Group

16

Period

7

Block

p-block

Electron configuration

[Rn] 7s² 5f¹⁴ 6d¹⁰ 7p⁴

Electrons per shell

2, 8, 18, 32, 32, 18, 6

Oxidation states

+4, +2, -2

Discovered

2000 by Yuri Oganessian and colleagues at Dubna, with Lawrence Livermore

Electron configuration

Full

1s² 2s² 2p⁶ 3s² 3p⁶ 4s² 3d¹⁰ 4p⁶ 5s² 4d¹⁰ 5p⁶ 6s² 4f¹⁴ 5d¹⁰ 6p⁶ 7s² 5f¹⁴ 6d¹⁰ 7p⁴

Noble gas shorthand

[Rn] 7s² 5f¹⁴ 6d¹⁰ 7p⁴

Shells

K: 2 · L: 8 · M: 18 · N: 32 · O: 32 · P: 18 · Q: 6

What it is used for

• Research only; no application outside the laboratory

Hazards

• Intensely radioactive; exists only as individual atoms in an accelerator

Melting point, boiling point, density and electronegativity are omitted: no measurement is possible. The mass given is the mass number of livermorium-293, the longest-lived at roughly 60 milliseconds.

Several physical properties are not listed for livermorium because no bulk sample has ever existed. Only a handful of atoms have been produced, often with half-lives measured in seconds, so published melting points and densities for elements in this range are calculations rather than measurements. They are omitted rather than presented as observed values.

Neighbours in the table

Group 16

Elements in the same group share their outer electron count, which is why they behave similarly in reactions. Livermorium sits in group 16 with oxygen, sulfur, selenium, tellurium, polonium.