californium
noun · first attested 1950
A magazine editorial mocked the name within months, and the discoverers had a ready answer.
Synthetic radioactive actinide element 98, symbol Cf, a strong neutron emitter used in reactor start-up sources and portable neutron probes.
37.0000°N -120.0000°W · Q99
Record
- Relationship
- Named from the place
- Confidence
- Well attestedThe place link is the standard scholarly account.
- Attested
- 1950
- Part of speech
- noun
Explanations here are written for this atlas. Dictionary text is not copied; the sources are linked so the claim can be checked.
- Step 1
California
- In English
californium
Thompson, Street, Ghiorso and Seaborg made californium in February 1950 by bombarding curium with alpha particles. The New Yorker suggested the Berkeley group should have called elements 97 and 98 universitium and ofium, so that the sequence spelled out university of california. Seaborg replied that they had considered it and declined, in case chemists in New York later found two elements and named them newium and yorkium.