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Ununhexium

Very few atoms of ununhexium (element 116) have been synthesized since its discovery in 2000. Ununhexium is extremely short-lived, rapidly decomposing to an isotope of element 114 - ununquadium.

Scientists from the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, at the University of California, in collaboration with the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research in Dubna, Russia and other collaborators, studied ununhexium isolated from the decay of ununoctium (Uuo). The researchers also produced element 116 in curium-calcium reactions [²⁴⁸Cm + ⁴⁸Ca and ²⁴⁵Cm + ⁴⁸Ca ].

Scientists believe that ununhexium may be metallic. This element could pose a radiation hazard if sufficient quantitites were collected in one location.

Previously, in 1999, scientists at Ernest Orlando Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, in California, identified this element as a decomposition product of ununoctium - element 118; however, these findings were later disproved.