Legs! Legs! Legs! (The Periodic Table) | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

[Music]. welcome to stuff you should know a. production of iHeart. Radio hey and welcome to the podcast I'm. Josh and there's Chuck and Jerry's here. too and this is the will get through it. edition of stuff you should know about. the periodic table uhhuh I have other. names for. it I'll bet you do can you say any of. them this is is the only time I hate my.

job. Edition this is the uh now we can stop. talking about the sun. episode maybe Edition uhuh uh and this. is the my God why do we ever do episodes. on chemistry Edition I failed chemistry. it's the only thing I've ever failed was. chemistry I don't think I even ever took. chemistry to tell you the truth hey you. didn't fail it right can't fail if you. don't try yeah um that's my Mot.

uh here's what I figured out about this. like driving myself mad trying to learn. this stuff and understand it um there is. a lot of people out there who have. written articles and explainers on the. stuff that we're going to talk about who. literally don't know what they're. talking about and yet they're presenting. their information like they do and it's. wrong and it it's you can't understand. it or in cases where you can understand. it it's still doesn't fully answer the.

question there's a lot of stuff out. there like that on this especially as it. gets more and more like Arcane right. yeah there's a whole group of people out. there chemists molecular chemists. physicists who understand this but you. can put them all together and they can't. coherently explain any of it to anybody. else they can just talk to one another. like this where we are where us and. everybody listening to this episode. right now is stuck in the middle yeah we. know enough that that we we can we can.

notice when somebody is wrong or not. correct or doesn't know what they're. talking about but we don't know enough. to understand what the actual scientists. are saying and then come back and. explain it so um first of all Breton cap. off to Livia for helping us with this. one boy Livia should get a bonus for. this one quite frankly for sure and then. second we might have to edit that out. we'll have to take the. budget secondly we can we're smart. enough to to get all this across we are.

and but we're also um uh transparent. enough to admit when we're like we don't. understand this part yeah I mean there's. a few parts I still don't get uh I. imagine the good news is I imagine that. maybe about 20% of our listenership is. even hearing this right now I hope more. than that because it's really. interesting stuff would you click on. something called how the periodic table. works well we're going to have to come. up with something else I think will call.

this one legs legs. legs colon tiny lettering periodic table. exactly the the sex episode right we'll. see we'll trick him into listening to it. all right uh I know I can get some of. this at the beginning so if you'll allow. me to talk about one of the only Parts I. understand sure all right great I'll. kick it off uh because we have to set. the stage sort of for pre periodic table. construction which is to say that early.

uh I'm sorry late in the 18th century we. were working from science was working. from the uh. aristotlean. Aristotelian yeah that is to say. Aristotle system which is uh which we've. talked about some uh recently which is. hey we got uh four elements fire earth. water and air and then after that. science became a little more nuanced and. they're like hey actually we think there. are more things out there more building. blocks yeah and um maybe we can.

distinguish them from one another and. categorize them maybe based on their. mass and this was sort of the scene when. in. 1804 a uh oddly an English school. teacher who was also a researcher named. John Dalton uhuh said all right um. things are made up of smaller things. maybe these which is not new like for. you know ancient cultures we even. talking about things being up of smaller. things yeah we talked about democ critis.

in that episode about things we believe. before the Scientific Method totally. that's exactly where it was but he said. things are made up maybe of like these. little tiny indestructible indivisible. atoms uh he got a lot of that wrong but. one thing he got right was the idea. that no two elements that we know about. so far which were not very many at all. uh at that point can have an identical. mass and all the atoms of that element. have the same mass which also wasn't. quite right but at the time it was right.

yeah because you got to give it up to. these guys when we're like analyzing. elements and atoms and stuff today we're. using like spectrometry and um particle. accelerators and doing all sorts of. amazing stuff these guys are like. burning things this is 1804 boiling them. in acid yeah like they were doing all. the stuff that a high school chemistry. teacher does to demonstrate chemistry. that's what they were doing to actually. isolate elements and like weigh them.

they were weighing things like oxygen. like they figured out that if you take a. a liter of oxygen um you will find that. it weighs 1.5 gr no matter where in the. world you weigh it it's going to weigh. 1.5 gram like that's what these people. are doing can you capture a liter of. oxygen I can't so I mean like what they. were doing was the hardcore like bloody. um up like roll up your sleeves kind of. chemistry like apparently it was like. one of the biggest scientific pushes of.

the 19th century was identifying. elements and John Dalton was the first. to say hey um some of these I think we. can kind of like try to organize them a. little bit and Dalton didn't um discover. any elements from what I understand he. was just the first one to come up with. atomic theory in the Modern Age and try. to start um ordering them based on. atomic weight yeah exactly uh it wasn't. quite the periodic table yet but it was. a precursor for sure and his very first.

version in 1803 only had the five. elements that we knew about at the time. uh hydrogen oxygen nitrogen carbon and. sulfur uh nitrogen was known as and I. think we said this in that other episode. The azote or is it doot I guess okay a o. t uh his second list just five years. later was up to 20 elements and then 24. years later by 1827 that list was up to. 36 uh and as science was progressing.

they started noticing patterns and they. started noticing sort of uh intervals. where things would repeat themselves. such that all of a sudden a German. chemist named Johan wolfgong in 1829. said well wait a minute we're noticing. these patterns and some of these things. are the same like uh if you look at. lithium sodium. potassium they have very similar. properties and we might can group those. together and those three in the mod. periodic table are grouped together in.

the same column so he was he was right. on the money as far as that idea yeah. and I mean we as humans are obsessed. with finding patterns in things and like. discovering a a latent pattern in nature. I mean there's few things more exciting. than that so these guys were looking for. patterns even in places where they. didn't necessarily exist um maybe. maneuvering things where they should or. shouldn't be um some people took some. cracks at it to try to to try to kind of. organize these elements by pattern but.

they ran into some problems one was the. chemistry wasn't as exact as it needed. to be to really organize stuff um there. was elements that hadn't been discovered. yet so there were big missing chunks but. they didn't necessarily know there were. big missing chunks but they were on the. right track that you could order these. things one way or another and when you. did they would start showing patterns. periodicity periodic table means that. there are periods or um patterns that. repeat themselves depending on how you.

organize these elements yeah and the the. modern periodic table that we know and. uh. loath. sorry I loath uh that thing that that. they pull down in science class that you. know teenagers just blankly stare at not. knowing what the heck they're looking at. but it's pretty sure if you say so mhm. uh we can we owe that to a Russian. chemist named Dimitri uh mind mindel and.

mindel in 1869 was working on a uh the. very first Russian language organic. chemistry textbook in 1869 and said you. know what we have 63 elements at this. point I think we can organize these and. he did so he arranged things in uh like. uh columns he had to reorder some things. from the the previous order uh so he's. like maybe we should organized just by.

atomic mass maybe we should order them. into these similarities and how they. behave and the big big thing that mindel. Lev landed on. was uh leaving gaps where he saw gaps. and instead of just you know buttoning. it up and making it look a certain way. he said I'm going to leave a gap here. and this is actually what kind of proved. his his worth in the fact that he was. really on the right track because in the. 15 years following him leaving those. gaps uh three elements were discovered. that fit those very gaps that he had.

left perfectly like a little puzzle. piece it's like the molecular chemistry. version of bab Ruth calling a shot yeah. basically essentially so like when it. turned out in the next 15 years they. found those elements that did not only. fill those spots but they had properties. that Mel have um predicted they would. like he was like they were like you you. did really good guy um he also predicted. some other ones that didn't come true. but everybody was just like whatever. it's fine um so that was like the model.

that everybody used from that point on. and it's the classic Model that we see. today where it's kind of like a a castle. with turrets on either side and you know. the the Brick in the middle and then the. there's like a couple of rows below that. are a moat if you squint hard enough. yeah that's Mev who came up with that. whole thing and the way that they're. arranged is not by atomic mass but by. atomic number that's why if you look and. the we should probably say the way you. read the periodic table is from left to. right and top to bottom right so the.

whole thing starts in the top left with. number one hydrogen and the reason it's. number one is because it has one proton. that's right it has one proton Chuck and. because it has one proton in its stable. form it has one electron and all that's. going to be important in a minute that's. right uh I mean should we go ahead and. take a break I feel like that was kind. of good setup material sure all right. we'll take a break and we'll be right. back with more things to Enlighten you. and numb you. [Music].

[Applause]. [Laughter]. all right so the modern periodic table. uh I think where was Mev he had 63 on.

his first yeah 63 known elements at the. time right on his first stab uh the. modern periodic table right now stands. at. 118 and I think they've already said. they think possibly maybe one day it may. top out at. 173 we'll see we'll see but that's sort. of you know the the thinking the logic. uh but right now we're at 118 elements. that we know about uh it includes uh on. the on the chart uh the name of the.

element uh they're usually a one or twl. symbol which is almost always short for. the name uh but in a case of gold like. when you see Au for gold and you're like. what the heck is that all about that. just means it's based on the Original. Latin for gold right uh. arum and they are placed like you said. before the break in order of their. atomic number which represents the. protons in each atom and that is what. makes that each element unique over.

those seven rows uh AKA periods and 18. numbered columns AKA groups yeah so the. rows across horizontally those are the. periods and like you said it's really. important to remember if you take a. proton and add it to an element you. don't have like a variation on the. element you have an entirely new element. everything else you can mess around with. fudge mess with the neutrons mess with. the electrons if you add a proton or. take away a proton you got a totally. different element which is why you can.

order them by their atomic number number. one with hydrogen number two helium. which has two um uh protons and so on. and so forth when you see that little. number in the top left of the square for. that element that's how many protons it. has but again um as we'll see if we're. talking about on the periodic table. stable uh atoms that means that they. don't have an electric charge they're. neutral and um that means that they have. an even number of protons and electrons.

protons are positively charged electrons. are negative negatively charged and if. you have one in one they cancel each. other out two and two they cancel each. other out or at the very least they make. the the electric charge. neutral all right so if you're looking. if you had if you've brought up a. picture by now of the periodic table. because you really want to follow along. yeah that's a good idea God bless you. for doing such a thing and secondly you. might say well wait a minute Chuck what. are those what's that underneath. everything uh we we'll get to this in a.

minute but those 14 short columns. underneath is called the F block and. those are the seventh and eth periods. AKA rows uh that are detached and those. are unnumbered rows whereas the other. rows are numbered through 18 so put a. pin in the F block uh all elements. within a period and again that is the. row if you're looking horizontal all the. elements on each row have the same. number of electron shell. and when you think about that in your.

mind's eye you're probably picturing how. we think of that in our Mind's Eye. because of chemistry class and science. class which is you know a circle around. an atom's nucleus that holds electrons. right like an orbit that's Neil's B's. contribution although well he made. plenty of contributions but the whole. idea that we have of the atom being. consisting of like a a nucleus that's. kind of like the sun and electrons or. orbiting around it like planets that's. thanks to Neil's bore um and the the.

actual orbit let's say you have just one. circle around the nucleus that's a shell. it's one Shell at another one that's the. second shell at another one that's the. third shell and they actually fill up in. order so when you follow along across. the um rows the horizontal rows called. periods on the um periodic table all of. those in that row have the same number. of shells one shell and the second shell. and the third shell and the fourth shell.

and as you go down each sh each row has. the all the shells that the ones above. it had and now they've added another. shell because their other shells are. full of. electrons right so if you look at. periodic table get out your little uh. picture and you look at that first row. or period uh that means it just has one. shell capable of holding up to two. electrons and so that's why there are. only two elements there hydrogen. uh usually has one electron and helium.

which normally has two and then you go. down from there the second and third. shells can hold up to eight electrons so. those second and third rows are each. going to have eight elements and so on. for the fourth and fifth it's 18 the six. and 7th hold 32 and so there are 32. elements on the six and seventh rows um. just to demonstrate a little further so. helium has two electrons in that one. shell helium full the first element on.

the next row that has a second shell. that's lithium lithium has two electrons. in its first shell that's full but it. has an extra electron so now it's added. another shell the second shell to house. that first electron and you go all the. way down to the very end of that row. that lithium starts and you find neon. and neon has 10 its first shell of two. is full of electrons its second shell. that can hold up to eight is full so it. has 10 total electrons this is what the. periods are showing us the number of.

shells and then eventually in a second. we'll know the number of electrons that. can fill those shells that's right and. the periods of the rows we're going to. say that a thousand times groups or. columns periods or rows because if if. there's one takeaway from this whole. thing right you can at least look smart. and when you walk into a room with a. periodic table chart and say and someone. says what are those rows and columns and. you can say do you mean groups and. periods yeah and then really quickly. after that look at your watch and be. like look at the time I'm late and run. out of the room so that there's no.

followup questions yeah and make a. U-shaped hole in the wall not the letter. U but a a y u shaped yeah nice did that. come through sure it did once you spell. it uh the groups are what we're going to. talk about next and those are the. columns and this is where mindel Lev uh. realized um these patterns were coming. into play and once you know subatomic. Theory came about and we started being. able to drill down further and further. we started to be able to get way more.

specific yeah so these patterns in these. Rhythms on the columns are based on the. number of veence electrons for each. element which means how many electrons. you would normally find in that. outermost shell yeah and the outermost. shell is important Chuck because that's. where all the action happens that's when. um atoms bond together to make new. molecules um that's where the attraction. or repulsion happens like that is the. that's the the ACT. um shell all the other shells are full.

and when a shell is full it's basically. content it just wants to sit there it. wants to be left alone but if that. outermost shell isn't full then it's. ready for some action it's it's got its. leather jacket on it's got its dice in. its pocket maybe a switch blade and it's. looking for for trouble yeah so more. than more than I think even rows like. all of the elements that are in a a row. remember horizontal across a period. they're related because they all have. the same shell the same number of shells. 1 2 3 4 and so on the groups up and down.

the columns they're more related really. because they have the same number of. electrons in that outermost shell they. can have a bunch of different numbers of. shells like for example I think um. Florine can have five shells but only. one electron in that that outermost. shell and or it could have one shell and. just have one electron in that outermost. shell like a hydrogen and they're more. related because they'll they'll react um.

to other things more than they would if. they had different numbers of. electrons yeah well we can add something. to something you should remember because. this will make you look even one step. smarter before you run out of the room. through the wall to say oh yeah you know. it's organized into uh periods and. groups and the periods of the rows and. the groups of the columns and if you ask. me the columns AKA groups that's really. where it's at they're more related. they're more related and then you run.

through the wall right so so let me give. you an example here okay all right this. is if you want to really really really. be smart use remember this right if you. have your periodic table out really. honestly it will make this whole thing. so much easier but if you look all the. way down to the second um group from the. right that starts with Florine yeah uh. if you look at Florine it has um I think. nine electrons and it's in Period two so. we know that it has two shells so we. know that it has two electrons in its.

first shell so it must have seven. electrons in its extra shell that or. second shell and since we know that the. second shell can hold eight there's a. there's one little irritating Gap and it. wants to fill it so Florine is super. duper reactive on the other hand you've. got things like potassium uh it has only. one electron in its our most shell and. it wants to actually get rid of that. electron because I think I said earlier. when when a shell is full the atom is.

content and happy it doesn't want to do. anything with anybody if it just has one. left over like one hole or one electron. it either wants to get rid of that one. electron so that it can lose that shell. and go down to the next Shell which is. full or it can fill its shell like. Florine wants to with an extra electron. either way they're super reactive and it. all happens in that outermost shell the. veilance shell and that's why that's. where all that action happens yeah and. you know you know what something I we. haven't even said that I think is.

important that dawned on me what is the. periodic table isn't just a like uh. let's just do this thing so we can group. them together uh a periodic table the. periodic table is made and it's. organized this way so chemist and people. that really know what they're doing can. look at a poster on a wall at any of. those squares and know because of where. it is on the row where it is on the. column mhm what color it is and what. block it is and we'll get to those.

things in a minute and they can know a. lot of very specific things just because. of where it sits and what it looks like. and what color it is yeah they can tell. you whether uh it's going to blow up in. water like like um like I guess. apparently sodium pure sodium does um. they can tell you if it's shiny um. there's all of this has to do just. almost entirely with the number of. electrons it has in its outermost shell. all that stuff that's the evolution of. the periodic table people notice.

properties physical properties they. noticed appearance stuff like that and. then as they learned more and more about. the atom they figured out why why in the. atom those properties existed and they. were able to classify those things. together in the periodic table so like. you said a chemist today can look at. that and be like oh that's going to be a. shiny metal that'll explode in your hand. if you look at it wrong because it's in. this group of elements right and I saw. it described by chemist really well if. you like to a chemist a periodic table.

looks like a a map to us like if you. look at a map of the United States you. you know that if you uh are looking at. someplace in the north it's going to be. colder there than say somewhere in the. South you don't know exactly what the. temperature is or anything like that. necessarily but you know generally based. on this map it's a map to the elements. yeah and it also might you know you. might think uh if you're looking at a. map of the South like that's where. people are more like this and in the.

midwest people maybe you know it tells. you a map tells you a lot more than just. like what the weather's like yeah just. like a periodic table so if a if a. scientist if a chemist looks at. silicon uh I look at it and I see a. capital S lowercase i the word Silicon. the number 14 in the leand corner and. that it's yellow uh a chemist looks at. it and says well I see it's in between. uh on the row aluminum and phosphorus. and in the in the column it's below.

carbon and above uh germanium and I see. its number is 14 and it's yellow which. means it's a metaloid so I can tell you. like these 12 things about silicon just. because of where it sits on that map yes. it's pretty amazing I just I don't get. it but it's amazing right I was I was. just going to say we're not going to. explain what those 14 things are because. they're the kind of things you have to. go to graduate school in chemistry to. truly understand it's okay that we don't. understand it all you have to take away.

from this and all we're trying to get. across is that trained chemists can look. at the periodic table and realize a lot. about whatever element they're looking. at and figure out how to mix it with. other elements to do um amazing things. or if you put together these two things. this is probably the reaction that. you're going to have yeah and it's also. for someone like us it can get really. confusing because when you look at. different periodic tables one thing. you'll notice is that colors may be. different like the there is no unless.

I'm wrong there isn't one completely. settled this is the only way to do it. periodic table oh no as far as a lot of. it goes but like you know depending on. who you are and how you want to organize. a periodic table that you use those. colors May mean different things so it. can get really really confusing oh yeah. uh when it comes to that stuff for sure. um and usually there is like a key or a. legend on the periodic table that says. this is what these colors mean but if. you take away the colors the layout of.

them across and down if you look at a. periodic table that's generally going to. be the same for any periodic table that. looks even roughly like what you're. looking at it's the colors that really. kind of change things up but more and. more as we've learned more about the. atom starting in the early 20th century. onward in quantum mechanics kind of. became a thing that got incorporated. into the periodic table as well and that. is where we get to essentially the Third.

Way that the whole thing's organized. which is by um blocks subshells s p d. and f. and. so take it away the number the number of. shells that a um an element has that's. its period across the number of. electrons in its outermost shell that's. its group M the blocks describe where. that outermost electron is and if you'll.

allow me for a second to just kind of. take a little Divergence here it's it. helps under helps you understand it I. think please can we talk about baseball. no not that kind of Divergence like. deeper into chemistry kind of Divergence. okay I'm going to go out and think about. baseball okay so um so that whole model. that Nils bore gave us of like the. planetoid nucleus and the or the sunlike. nucleus and the planetoid electron.

orbiting it that is really off that's. not at all what they're like it's good. for people who don't really care about. this kind of thing to to walk around. thinking but when you actually start to. try to understand the periodic table it. really gets in the way so if you can. kind of throw that out and instead think. of. electrons as not particles like. planetoids they're actually waves of. energy right and they like to orbit. atoms because their negative electrical.

charge is attracted to the positive. electrical charge of the protons that's. why they're orbiting or flying around. that nucleus but they don't do it in. like these tight Little Orbits like a. planet does around like the Sun instead. they inhabit three-dimensional areas. that follow predictable shapes depending. on the energy level of that electron you. can say what shape it's going follow. around that nucleus but you can't say.

where it is at any given point in time. thanks to our friend Heisenberg's. uncertainty principle Heisenberg said. you can know the velocity of an object. or you can know the location of a. Quantum object you can't know both and. because we know the uh the energy of an. object we can figure out its velocity at. speed uh like an electron which means we. can't know where it is so these orbits. actually are where they may be 90% of.

the time that's what an actual electron. orbit is and again it follows these. weird cool looking little. three-dimensional fourleaf Clover shapes. just really neat and depending on the. energy of the electron it's going to. inhabit a specific Place 90% of the time. around the the nucleus of that atom. either close to the atom further out. further out depending on the shell that. it's associated with and the block is.

where the highest energy the outermost. electron is in that position and again. it's denoted by SP D and F and it gets. way more Arcane than that but all you. have to remember is that when you're. looking at blocks they're talking about. the specific location of the most. energetic electron and again since the. outermost electrons are where all the. action happens the most energetic of the. outer most electrons are really where. the action happens and that's why um.

it's become a little more sophisticated. a little more refined over time thanks. to the addition of quantum mechanics um. in our understanding of the. atom are you there Chuck did you go. outside sorry I just came back in I I. didn't actually think about baseball I. was just kidding I I watched an entire. baseball game oh who. won uh I have no. joke my brain is too mushy for a joke. right now uh no that I actually listened.

to that and I learned from you so I. appreciate that thank you because I felt. like I was hanging from a trapas by my. fingernails well I was underneath you. with a net that's all I'm good for. thanks buddy I appreciate it and by the. way I didn't want to just walk past. that's all you're good for I just could. even bring myself to recognize such a. dumb thing that was said I appreciate. that uh so the final thing we got to. talk about is kind of brings it back. back to the beginning of how they. originally just started to think about.

grouping things which was by their. atomic mass the the sort of very basic. thing that they first thought they could. use as a grouping device and they still. uh will indicate the atomic mass on most. periodic tables but the atomic mass is. actually a weighted average of the uh. the amount of protons plus neutrons but. it depends on how abundant different. isotopes in that element are out in. nature and it's not always the same so. uh carbon is a great example that Livia. used it always has six protons usually.

has six neutrons but sometimes can have. seven or eight so instead of having an. atomic mass of just 12 6 plus 6 they. take a weighted average and it and it. weighs out to. 12.011 so if you see those numbers with. a decimal point you can understand that. that's because it's a weighted average. and not just a locked in number yeah and. just it doesn't necessarily have much to. do with the periodic table but you. mentioned Isotopes and all those are is. an element with more or less electrons.

than it has when it's stable in a. neutral charge if you take away an. electron it has more positively charged. protons than electrons so that's a. positive ion if you add an electron like. say Florine wants to do um it becomes a. it has more electrons than protons so it. becomes a negatively charged isotope so. those are possible too but just bear in. mind you're not changing ing the number. of protons because if you do that you. have a new element you're just changing.

the number of electrons either adding or. taking away and one of the other things. about the periodic table is you can. point to different different sections. and be like those are the ones that form. positive ions because they give away. their extra electron those are the ones. that form negative ions because they. attract extra electrons than they. normally have in their neutrally charged. State that's another thing that you can. just point to at the periodic. table pretty amazing it is I mean the. fact that people have figured this out. is just hats off to all of the.

scientists that were involved in this. over the years yeah uh I say we take a. break sure and when we come back we're. going to tell you about how things got. very interesting in terms of the. periodic table in the 1930s right after. [Music]. [Applause]. this. [Laughter].

Chuck I feel like we made it through the. the hardest part we're out of the out of. the woods as it I'm shaking a little. less I am too but I won't fully relax. for another 15 just hang there 10 to 15. minutes hang in there we'll we'll get it. all right so what happened in the 1930s. oh well a guy named Dr Lawrence I can't. remember but he the Lawrence Livermore.

um Laboratories named after him in part. um invented particle accelerators where. you use incredible amounts of energy to. throw trillions of particles of. different weights or specific weights at. a Target. atom tell them what Einstein how. Einstein described this process uh like. shooting birds in the dark in a country. where there are only a few Birds right. like the chances of you actually having. a collision are so remote that you like.

they're almost Indescribable. mathematically but if you shoot. trillions of particles you really. increase your chances of there being. some kind of collision and when you. Collide a um one particle one atom with. another atom with enough energy they can. combine and when you add proton to. proton remember you get a new element. and so with particle accelerators they. were able to start creating elements. that you can't find in nature and they. started doing this all the way back in. the 1930s and this research is what.

actually directly led to nuclear bomb. apparently when Einstein heard that um. that Lawrence had created this particle. accelerator he advised FDR to start. working on a bomb because it was now a. thing like the the the the world had. just been prepared um scientifically for. a bomb to exist soon yeah so lab created. elements uh like you said started being. a thing uh and 1937 uh anything past. Uranium on the chart uh you cannot find.

in nature because it decays much too. fast to even be around and and know it's. a thing and study but uh so anything. past uranium as lab created and in. 1937 uh Tech uh techum was the very. first Blank Spot to be filled in uh with. a lab created element as number. 43 um nuclear bombs that you mentioned. when they started doing the the you know. nuclear tests uh out on the Marshall.

Islands in the ' 50s they would send uh. planes out into these explosions with. filters on them to scoop up unusual. atoms and discover potentially elements. uh that is how we got Element 99 named. Einsteinium and I guess we should talk a. little bit about the naming uh because. the. IUPAC actually has rules around this it. says new elements have to be named after. a and this is very interesting a a. mineral a place or a country a property.

or a scientist or a mythological. concept which is fascinating so we have. some of the the latest elements I. believe in 2016 is when we got 113. through 18 we got uh the element uh. tennessine because it was uh there were. institutions in Tennessee that led to. the discovery of this super heavy. element and so they named it tennessine. and most of them sort of follow that. naming convention yeah nihonium is named. after nian which is the Japanese name.

for Japan a muscovian is named after. Moscow where the lab where that was. created. inisan aganan aganan aganis that's what. it is it's named after a guy named Yuri. oganesian who is a Russian essentially. element Hunter now he has um got tons of. funding behind him has set up new. particle accelerators with more and more. energy and is bashing things together in.

the search for entirely new elements. that not only don't exist on Earth they. may not exist anywhere else in the. universe they may only exist. theoretically until uh oganessian. manages to smash the right atoms. together to create those elements for a. Pico second like they're so unstable. that they last almost no time at all. which makes them totally useless to us. yeah as of now the fact that like you. said they predicted I think it's going.

to go up to. 173 yeah and we're at 10 what 18 makes. people like essian just crazy like they. want to find them allall and he actually. found a couple of those um most recent. ones that were uh in uh inducted I guess. in the periodic table in. 2016 yeah and this is kind of cool too. uh oganessian apparently wanted to name. that element Stardust in honor of David.

Bowie but it didn't fit the naming. criteria oh yeah yeah too bad so sad. yeah too bad so uh as far as the sort of. uh the Koda on this um Libby is Keen to. point out that um there are gaps in the. framework still um there are issues when. you look at the periodic table uh you. needn't only look at the very first one. hydrogen at the the far left of the. table it's there because it has that one. electron but it is not like any of the.

rest of its group because the rest of. them are all alkali metals uh it's. actually more similar to something like. chlorine which is in the second column. from the right right uh but you know. there there's still debate on. like it's not settled on where things. should be placed on these various and. there have been you know there. alternative tables that people have put. out over the years with different tweaks. some small some large and it's it's. pretty interesting I think and there's. also that um two period section that's.

always removed from the rest of the the. periodic table it's put down below it. those two sections actually go in that's. the F block right yeah the the bottom. two rows so they come after I think. Barum um and just go all the way over to. oh I can't remember the other one but. imagine that the periodic table was. looked like it did but then the bottom. two rows were about twice as long as. they are now it' look weird and it's.

because you would take that lower F. block and put it into its proper place. if you're arranging these things by. atomic number but the reason why the F. block is pulled out is because those two. rows of elements the actines and laan I. think they might like follow an atomic. number in that way but their properties. are totally different from their periods. or their groups and the reason why is. because they're the only two groups that.

have the um F position subshell filled. by an electron which completely Alters. their everything it's just different. than all of the other ones um and it's. it's different enough that they just. basically removed it until they can. figure out where it should sit because. depending on how you interpret where. like how the periodic table should be. laid out they should go here they should. should go there or they should just stay. out like they are now yeah uh there are.

some and and it's kind of fun to look. some of these up if you want to see some. kind of cool at the very least just. aesthetic examples and then they're not. just like oh this looks cooler uh it. makes sense to the person who has put. out this whatever alternative uh or. alternate periodic table like in 1949. Olivia found one from Life Magazine uh. that is a spiral and there are quite a. few different spiral or spiric design n. where you have hydrogen at the center. and it's sort of like racetrack shape um.

if you look at any just look up. spiral-based periodic chart and they're. very um nice to look at I imagine. they're much much harder to sort of make. sense of and read unless you're the. person who who made it or a. chemist yeah a chemist would still. probably be like well why you doing it. that way I liked it the other way uh or. that 3D one that Timothy Stow uh came up. with that I think physicists are pretty.

keen on that has three axis of different. colors that represent quantum numbers uh. that describe the electrons but it's you. know if you look at a 3D version that's. kind of cool too but if you find the one. the traditional one confusing as a non-. chemisty looking at any of the these. other ones it's really confusing yeah. and it's all it is is it's saying well. actually no I think we should arrange. them so that they're connected more by. this prop like electr negativity or. they're shiny or they're pretty I like.

this these elements and so we're going. to put them together these are my. favorite elements it's just kind of like. that and so you can bend them in all. sorts of weird shapes yeah I have my own. periodic table I've designed oh yeah and. it is just a big black uh block uh and. then Times New Roman and yellow. lettering in the middle it says who. gives a s right I would have imagined it. was a traditional periodic table but. scratched out with a pen almost. violently no that's good I like that.

better I'm going to change mine I've got. uh one other thing that doesn't has a. lot to do with everything but not. anything we're going to go into but. there are some especially um those uh. elements that don't occur in nature and. they have to create in particle. accelerators yeah but also some that. occur in nature like gold and Mercury. are two good. examples they have. electrons that spin so fast that are. moving it such incredible energies that. they actually are like a significant.

fraction of the speed of light that's. how fast they're going and it doesn't. matter whether you're talking about a. like a photon or a planet or a black. hole or an electron anything that has. mass and can move at anything like half. the speed of light is going to actually. Bend time and space and so for some uh. kinds of elements that have relativist. speeds meaning their electrons travel. close to the speed of light they have.

all sorts of freaky decky um properties. it's why gold is gold not going to get. into that just trust me it's why gold is. gold um but also it means that if you. could go into those atoms and just kind. of exist in them as if they were a. universe you would see that th that time. and space was bent compared to how time. and space exists outside of those atoms. like on our level that's what Atomic. scientists have figured out and it's. actually kind of having a a.

mind-breaking effect on the periodic. table to an extent uh amazing I think so. too that's it Chuck we did periodic. tables it's done you did great oh boy we. don't have to do it again no I don't. think so God I hope not yeah good what. is this Murphy's. Law um well since I said Murphy's Law. and Chuck laughed because he got the. joke you may not have and that's okay uh. that means it's time for listener. mail all right I'm going to call this a.

very quick followup from our Halloween. episode uh as we record this it is. actually Halloween so that has just come. out today mhm and we have something from. Owen that uh perhaps explains something. that we kind of wondered about uh Hey. guys once again loving the yearly. Spooktacular figured I'd mention my take. on what the hermit meant hermit hermit. meant when he said the Man's eyes didn't. match his mouth oh yeah uh I think it. might have something to do with honesty. like the words of encouragement Were.

Somehow. disingenuine uh that lined up with the. idea that the hermit is sort of seeing. flaws and faults that makes sense to me. eyes didn't match his mouth that's like. the best explanation I've heard so far. it's also the only explanation but it's. a good one I think that's totally it uh. and Owen says regardless of whether. that's the author's intent I'm using the. description in a song I'm writing oh co. so thanks for the inspiration and in all. honesty uh The Voice work is on point. this year uh that is from Owen thanks a.

lot Owen here's a here's some. inspiration for the Musical part of your. [Laughter]. song no uh if you want to be like Owen. and WR in to explain something to us we. love that kind of thing you can put it. in an email and send it off to stuff. podcast iheartradio.com. stuff you should know is a production of. iHeart radio for more podcasts iHeart.

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