Molecular compounds with heavy elements, like americium, curium and others can now be synthesized in a streamlined and efficient way thanks to a new technique developed by Lawrence Livermore National ...

When stars die, they spread the elements they’ve created in their cores out to space. But other objects and processes in space also create elements. Eventually, that “star stuff” scatters across the ...

For much of the twentieth century, scientists believed that the heaviest naturally occurring elements formed primarily inside stars. Over the past two decades, astronomical observations and laboratory ...

A smattering of plutonium atoms embedded in Earth’s crust are helping to resolve the origins of nature’s heaviest elements. The result bolsters a recent change of heart among astrophysicists. Standard ...

How heavy can an element be? An international team of researchers has found that ancient stars were capable of producing elements with atomic masses greater than 260, heavier than any element on the ...

Until recently it was thought neutron star mergers were the only way heavy elements (heavier than Zinc) could be produced. These mergers involve the mashup of the remnants of two massive stars in a ...

A strange, newly measured clump of stars orbiting the nearby Andromeda galaxy has the lowest level of heavy chemical elements ever seen in one of these mysterious star clusters. Named RBC EXT8, this ...

Heavy duty: artist’s impression of a kilonova releasing r-process elements into the cosmos. (Courtesy: ESO/L Calçada/M Kornmesser) The mystery of where heavy elements such as gold and silver come from ...

Until recently it was thought neutron star mergers were the only way heavy elements (heavier than Zinc) could be produced. These mergers involve the mashup of the remnants of two massive stars in a ...