Artificial radioactive element properties unknown	memory peg
	2006 (2002) Ю.Ц. Оганесян (Yu.Ts. Oganessian) and co-workers, Dubna, Russia
	un-un-oct-ium = 1-1-8-ium

First prepared in 2002 by Юрий Цолакович Оганесян (Yuri Tsolakovich Oganessian), V.K. Utyonkov, Yu.V. Lobanov, F.Sh. Abdullin, A.N. Polyakov, I.V. Shirokovsky, Yu.S. Tsyganov, A.N. Mezentsev, S. Iliev, V.G. Subbotin, A.M. Sukhov, O.V. Ivanov, A.A. Voinov, K. Subotic, V.I. Zagrebaev, М.Г. Иткис (M.G. Itkis) (ОИЯИ / JINR), K.J. Moody, J.F. Wild, M.A. Stoyer, N.J. Stoyer, C.A. Laue, D.A. Shaughnessy, J.B. Patin, and R.W. Lougheed (Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, University of California) at the Лаборатория ядерных реакций им. Г.Н. Флерова / Flerov Laboratory of Nuclear Reactions, FLNR - ОИЯИ / JINR, Дубна (Dubna), Russia.

The element does not have a name yet, therefore the systematic IUPAC name is used (system explained below.

At the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research (JINR) in Dubna, Russia, physicists (including collaborators from Lawrence Livermore National Lab in the United States) have sent a beam of calcium-48 ions into a target of californium-249 atoms to create temporarily a handful of atoms representing element 118. The nucleus for these atoms have a total atomic mass of 294 units.
In fact, only three of these atoms, the heaviest ever produced in a controlled experiment, were observed. After sending 2 x 10¹⁹ calcium projectiles into the target, one atom of element 118 was discovered in the year 2002 and two more atoms in 2005. The researchers held up publication after seeing their first specimen in order to find more events. According to Livermore physicist Ken Moody, speaking at a press conference today from Livermore, the three events have been well studied and the odds of a statistical fluke at work here are less than a part in 100 thousand.
In searching through 10¹⁹ collision events, how do you know you have found a new element? Because of the clear and unique decay sequence involving the offloading of alpha particles, nuclear parcels consisting of two protons and two neutrons. In this case, nuclei of element 118 decay to become element 116 (hereby itself discovered for the first time), and then element 114, and then element 112 by emitting detectable alphas. The 112 nucleus subsequently fissions into roughly equal-sized daughter particles.
The average lifetime observed for the three examples of element 118 was about one millisecond, not long enough to perform any kind of chemical tests (you'd need an hour's time for that). Element 118 lies just beneath radon in the periodic table and is therefore a kind of noble gas. (from Physics news update).

Further reading (information)

• Yu.Ts. Oganessian et al., "Results from the first ²⁴⁹Cf + ⁴⁸Ca Experiment (Russian text), English abstract.
• Yu.Ts. Oganessian et al., "Synthesis of the isotopes of elements 118 and 116 in the ²⁴⁹Cf and ²⁴⁵Cm+⁴⁸Ca fusion reactions. Physical Review C 74, 044602 (October 2006). Abstract.
• Livermore scientists team with Russia to discover element 118. Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. News Release, NR-06-10-03
• Controversy-Plagued Element 118, the Heaviest Atom Yet, Finally Discovered Physicsbuz, 13 Oct. 2006 (with many naming suggestions)
• Phil Schewe and Ben Stein, Elements 116 and 118 Are Discovered, Physics News Update, Number 797 #1, October 16, 2006

The systematic names for the new discovered elements are derived from their atomic numbers. Each digit is convertend into a word based on Latin and Greek words for the number, at the end a suffix is added.

digit & syllable	derivation	Russian	other variants
0 = nil	Latin nihil = nothing	нил
1 = un	Latin unus = one	ун	ūn Latvian
2 = bi	Latin bis = two as adverb	би
3 = tri	Latin tres = three		terc§ Croatian
4 = quad	Latin quattuor = four	квад	kvad Croatian, Esperanto, Latvian cuad Spanish (also quad)
5 = pent	Greek pente = five
6 = hex	Greek ex = six	хекс	heks Croatian, Latvian, Norwegian
7 = sept	Latin septem = seven	септ
8 = oct	Latin octo = eight	окт	okt Croatian, Latvian
9 = en*	Greek ennea = nine...
Suffix = -ium**	usual for elements	-ий	-io Italian, Portuguese, Spanish -иjум Serbian -ij Croatian -ijs Latvian

* if necessary, a "n" may be added.
** after bi and tri the suffix is -um, -й, etc.
§ in the Croatian periodic table element 113 is given as ununtercij

Example element 116: 1 + 1 + 6 = un + un + hex + ium = ununhexium, symbol Uuh; element 120 will be unbinilium, symbol Ubn.

Further reading:

• Commission on the Nomenclature of Inorganic Chemistry, Recommendations for the Naming of Elements of Atomic Numbers Greater than 100 (Rules Approved 1978). (on-line)
• Elementary, my dear IUPAC: Naming the rarest of atoms by Michael Quinion.