In addition to the unknown element 43 sandwiched between molybdenum and ruthenium, the 44th element, has fascinated chemists and mineralogists, there are many gaps in the periodic table waiting to be filled in and discovered.

Not to mention the transuranic element after the ninety-second element, one is also curious about what the one that is blank in the eighty-fifth should be when counting seven elements from uranium to the front.

Element 85, which belongs to group VII.A on the periodic table, is all listed in the column before the group of elements.

Just like the rare gases, which are another name for the 〇 group elements, the elements of the VII.A group also have another name for the halogen group elements.

Directly above the blank space of element 85 are four halogen elements that have been discovered by mankind, namely fluorine (F), chlorine (Cl), bromine (Br), and iodine (I).

The predecessor of element 85, element 84, was polonium (Po), discovered in 1898 by Chen Muwu's mother-in-law, Marie Curie, and her husband, Mr. Curie.

The latter of element 85, element 86, began with the discovery of thorium vapor by Chen Muwu's teacher, Rutherford, in 1899, and in 1908, Ramsey confirmed that it was a new element, and it was also the sixth noble gas, radon (Rn).

Therefore, on the periodic table, whether it is before or after element 85 or above, there are elements in all three positions, only element 85 is still blank here.

Although it has been known that the sixth group of elements is still a gas and a non-metal, chemists are still not sure whether this fifth halogen element is a metal or not.

- Unless anyone can find out what element it is, then it is self-evident whether it is a metal element or not.

Chen Muwu asked Frederick to go to Uppsala University to find natural radioactive sources that can produce alpha particles, as well as the element metal bismuth, which is ranked at position 83 on the periodic table, in order to be able to discover the mysterious element 85.

And the reason why Chen Muwu didn't use protons to bombard the No. 84 element was not because polonium was radioactive, but because polonium was too expensive, and Uppsala University wouldn't necessarily lend it to them, or maybe they didn't have it at all?

Fortunately, there are still alpha particles in this world that contain two protons, so using the alpha particles to bombard element 83 can also find the element 85 they want.

Bi＋α→Ｘ（At）＋2n；

Bi＋α→Ｘ（At）＋3n；

Bi＋α→Ｘ（At）＋4n。

Chen Muwu thinks that it is also very good to use this element 85 as the first synthetic element in human history.

The only drawback is that this new element cannot be named "Zhongyu halogen", because the etymology of Zhongyu China, plus the suffix -ine of the halogen element, the two combine to become Chine.

The word Chine still means Chinese in French, which can be confusing.

But this is not difficult for Chen Muwu, because he found a new element, in addition to naming it after the country to which he belongs, he can also use the name of the university or research institute to name it.

Of course, Chen Muwu certainly doesn't use Gustaf to name him Gustafine, nor does he use Cambridge University to name him Cambridgine.

Chen Muwu only planned to choose between two names he came up with, either Cavendish after the Cavendish Lab or Tangshine after the Ministry of Communications' Yanshan University.

In fact, if this eighty-fifth element could be discovered a few years earlier, Chen Muwu would have his third choice.

That is, after the capital of China, Shaojing, it was named Shaojing Halogen (Shibei) (Beijine).

It's a pity that the time is a little too late, and the new Beijing government of China will immediately move the capital from Shaojing to Shengjing, and Shaojing will be renamed Shaoping.

Therefore, Chen Muwu categorically ruled out the choice of naming the new element after the national capital, and he did not want to use the name of this new element as a political gift to the newly established government in China.

He didn't want to get dirty.

Although Chen Muwu has already thought of the name of the new element, if he does not discover this new element at the first time, then he will automatically lose the right to name it, and it is useless to think of more names.

Thinking of this, Chen Muwu's heart was full of fighting spirit.

He clapped his hands in this laboratory and said to the other four people in the five-person experimental team: "Everyone, let's work together, now that the cyclotron has been completely built, it is necessary for us to quickly achieve an outstanding result on it, so that physicists all over the world realize that this cyclotron, which has been manufactured at a great cost, is not a silver-like pewter gun head, but can really achieve many research results." ”

Zhao Zhongyao and Cowcroft had been experimenting with Chen Muwu for several years in the Cavendish laboratory at Cambridge University, so they did not doubt Chen Muwu's words at all.

Frederick also nodded beside him, he wanted to see why Chen Muwu had let him run to Uppsala University again, and brought in a natural radioactive source that can produce alpha particles, and bismuth, a metal element that is not usually used in physics experiments at all.

Among these people, only Irena, who is nominally the closest to Chen Muwu, has the greatest doubts about Chen Muwu.

It's true that his prospective brother-in-law is a genius in physics research, and it's easy to look at him.

But how can he be sure that new results will be achieved with cyclotrons?

And the other three people too, how could they have no doubt that Chen Muwu would definitely be able to do this?

Chen Muwu saw that his future wife's sister was suspicious of him, so he decided to explain to the other four people in the group what he was going to do today before doing the experiment.

He cleared his throat and spoke:

"Everyone, everyone!

The great Russian chemist Mendeleev, in his periodic table, had already predicted the existence of an iodine-like element under iodine.

Later, the British scientist Moselle, who died on the battlefield of World War I, determined that the atomic number of this point-like element should be eighty-five.

"Chemists around the world have been looking for this iodine-like element since Mendeleev.

And the basis for their search for the elements is entirely based on Mr. Mendeleev's judgment, that iodine-like elements are halogenated elements, and halogen-like elements are all salt-forming elements, so everyone has been trying to find traces of iodine-like elements No. 85 among various salts.

"I remember that the year before last, in the summer of 1925, there was a chemist named Firiander, who went to the Dead Sea in the Middle East on a hot summer day, hoping to find this iodine-like element in the salt precipitated from the world's most famous salt lake.

However, he did sufficient chemical analysis and spectroscopic analysis, but he could not find the slightest trace of this iodine-like element.

"Element No. 85 has polonium in front of it and radon in the back, and to take a very inappropriate analogy, according to the law of entrapment in calculus, this iodine-like element must exist, but people have not yet found it in nature."

The joke told by Chen Muwu made several people present laugh.

None of them thought that a mathematical formula could be applied to chemical elements.

Chen Muwu continued: "Just because it's hard to find in nature doesn't mean it can't be artificially made in the laboratory.

"That's why I asked Frederick to go to Uppsala University and borrowed the two things I needed.

"And we at Prince College have just developed the world's most advanced cyclotron that can accelerate particles.

"Since I'm in the Cavendish lab at Cambridge University, I can use that electrostatic particle accelerator to complete the helium-3 atom formed by the fusion of hydrogen and deuterium atoms.

"So now that we're in Stockholm, can we use a cyclotron to fuse alpha particles with bismuth-209?"

Chen Muwu said the general idea of the experiment he was going to carry out next.

After hearing Chen Muwu's words, Frederick, who went to Uppsala University to borrow medicine, was startled.

At first, he thought that Chen Muwu wanted bismuth and alpha particles because bismuth was a non-radioactive element with the largest atomic number.

Polonium, radon, francium, radium, actinium, thorium, protactinium, protactinium, and uranium are all unstable radioactive elements, and among them there is also a gas.

These unstable radioactive elements, which can become other elements at any time, must not be mounted on the target of a cyclotron.

Otherwise, it is likely that the product of the experiment will be contaminated, so that some impurities will be mixed into it, and it will not be able to test what the product after bombardment is very good.

Frederick also thought that Chen Muwu was going to bombard the bismuth element with alpha particles, so as to try to see if he could get the kind of electrically neutral particles in the nucleus that Cavendy had been pursuing in the laboratory from this non-radioactive metal element with the largest atomic number.

Unexpectedly, Chen Muwu's idea was much more vigorous than his, he did not want to shoot out electrically neutral particles, but wanted to use the accelerated alpha particle bombardment method to turn the bismuth element into another element with a larger atomic number.

If Chen Muwu's idea was put in the Middle Ages, it would be the alchemy that those warlocks dreamed of.

If he can really turn the No. 83 element bismuth into the No. 85 element iodine, will he be able to turn the No. 26 element iron into the No. 79 element gold, and create value continuously?

But in fact, Frederick's idea cannot be said to be completely wrong, if he can see the nuclear reaction equation that Chen Muwu came up with in his brain, he can see that behind the iodine-like element, the product of the alpha particle bombardment bismuth element, there are two or three or four new particles with zero charge and one relative atomic mass.

If Chen Muwu wanted to, he only needed to put an extra paraffin crystal rich in hydrogen atoms behind the target of the cyclotron, and he could deduce the existence of electrically neutral particles in the reaction products from the bombarded protons.

It's just that the protagonist thinks that he will synthesize new elements if he synthesizes new elements, and now it's not too time for neutrons to come out.

After explaining the purpose of the experiment and the possible results of the vision, the next step is to do the experiment and turn the protagonist's idea into reality.

In addition to the protagonist, the remaining four people present were all motivated after some bloody encouragement.

If, as the protagonist says, they use alpha particles accelerated by cyclotrons to bombard bismuth to obtain a new elemental iodine, then this is definitely a significant stroke in the history of chemistry.

Bismuth is a relatively stable metal that oxidizes slowly only in air with high relative humidity.

So at Prince's College, you don't need to reduce the bismuth borrowed from Uppsala University, you just need to polish off a layer of oxide on the surface of the covered sample.

Anyway, the cyclotron is in a high vacuum state, and basically there will be no oxidation reaction of the polished metal bismuth.

Having determined what to do with the experiment, the team of five quickly returned to their previous busy state.

Irena and Frederick go to polish the metal bismuth, and the protagonist, along with Zhao Zhongyao and Cockcroft, dismantle the proton source that was installed in the middle of the cyclotron and replace it with a radioactive particle source that Frederick borrowed from Uppsala University.

The protagonist is not in the least worried that the experiment will not be successful, but he is still worried about another thing.

Among the five people present, although they are currently engaged in research to discover new chemical elements, they are all from physics classes.

The protagonists are now worried about only one thing, and that is that even if they did fuse to form this eighty-fifth element X through bombardment.

But how can we be sure that we are discovering this new element?

The middle school thinks that it is better to find a professional chemist to come and do a test for everyone?

It is unlikely that the results of the experiments could be sent or brought back to England by mail or by a human being, to Professor Aston in Cavendis's lab, or to Frederick Sody, a former right-hand man of the teacher Rutherford.

Because the 85th element iodine produced has the longest half-life among all isotopes, and it will not exceed ten hours.

If iodine-211 had been brought back to the UK, it would have already become bismuth-207 or lead-207 by the time it was delivered to chemists.

Ｘ→α＋Bi；

Ｘ＋e→Po→α＋Pb。

(End of chapter)