Nihonium and the 113th Element: Japan’s Century-Long Journey to the Periodic Table

Summary

The podcast explores the long and challenging path to nihonium, the 113th element, tracing its discovery by Japanese scientists at the Riken Institute and the period‑spanning history of heavy element discovery. It begins with Masataka Ogawa’s 1909 misidentification of an element, then moves to the intense 2003‑2012 hunt for 113, including collaborations and competition with US Russian teams, the world’s electricity crisis after the Fukushima disaster, and the final 2012 decay-chain proof that confirms 113. The episode closes with Iupac’s 2016 naming of nihonium, acknowledging Japan’s contributions and correcting a historical blemish. The program also previews the next story on flerovium, element 114.

• Key arc: the century-long struggle to recognize Japan on the periodic table
• Evidence: the 2012 decay chain that confirmed element 113
• Resolution: naming the element nihonium in 2016
• Broader context: the long quest for heavy elements such as flerovium

Introduction

The podcast marks Dmitri Mendeleev’s birthday and continues its decade‑long exploration of the stories behind chemical elements, starting with the heaviest known at the time. Kit Chapman leads listeners through the Japan‑centered chapter of element 113, nihonium, framing it as a century‑spanning battle for national recognition in the periodic table.

The Ogawa Moment and a National Mistake

The narrative begins in 1909 when Masataka Ogawa, working with William Ramsay, reported an unknown substance that Ogawa claimed to be element 43, named naponium after Japan. Replicability failed and the element 43 was later identified as technetium by Perrier and Sigre. In the decades that followed, it became clear that Ogawa had likely misidentified element 75, rhenium, casting a long shadow over Japanese science and national pride for a century.

The Road to 113

Transitioning to the 21st century, a team at the Nishina Center for Accelerator Based Science in Wako City, led by Kosuke Morita, attempted to create a new element by bombarding Bismuth‑209 with Zinc‑70 ions at roughly 0.1c. This cold fusion approach, pursued alongside rival hot fusion experiments conducted by a US‑Russian team at Dubna and Lawrence Livermore, sought evidence for element 113 and its subsequent decay products. Early sightings in 2003–2005 were inconclusive, and IUPAC did not accept the results at that time. The Japanese team persisted despite financial pressures and an electricity crisis following the 2011 Fukushima disaster, which halted most accelerator work except for a minimal remaining experiment.

The Earthquake, the Energy Crisis, and the Decisive Moment

The Fukushima disaster pushed electricity costs higher and constrained the research program. Yet Morita’s group kept a single experiment alive, focusing on the 113 search. On August 12, 2012, a third decay chain was observed that did not decay to dubnium but to lawrencium and mendelevium, providing unambiguous evidence that the Japanese team had indeed created element 113.

Name and Recognition

In 2016, the Rican researchers proposed a name for the element, nihonium, acknowledging the country of discovery and addressing a historical wrong. The world accepted the name in November of that year. The episode emphasizes how a national setback from a century earlier was transformed into formal recognition for Japanese science on the periodic table.

The Next Chapter

As the program closes, Kit Chapman teases the story of flerovium, element 114, highlighting the long, Cold War era rivalry and the decades‑long journey to its discovery. The podcast also points listeners to a special page that aggregates element‑themed content produced by Chemistry World and Future Factual, inviting continued exploration of the periodic table’s evolving landscape.

Conclusion

The episode demonstrates how scientific prestige, international collaboration, and perseverance shape our understanding of the elemental world, using nihonium as a case study in the ongoing story of the periodic table.