Talk:Tennessine

Half-life of Tennessine

From the section 'Nuclear Stability and Isotopes': "Tennessine is the second-heaviest element created so far, and has a half-life of less than one second; this is longer than the predicted value used in the discovery report."

"[L]ess than one second [...] is longer than the predicted value" is awkward and uninformative. However, my knowledge of chemistry is not strong enough to confidently improve it. This sentence cites a research paper that I take to be the discovery report in question (Oganessian, Yu. Ts.; Abdullin, F. Sh.; Bailey, P. D.; et al. (2010)), but the paper gives multiple (predicted?) half-life values for Tennessine, depending on the isotope. I am not sure where to find the most current value, or whether it's even accurate to say that "Tennessine" (as opposed to an isotope of Tennessine) has any particular half-life.

Help from anyone who understands this topic would be appreciated.

--✶♏✶ 01:05, 27 September 2017 (UTC)

I think what it really should say is that the two known isotopes (tennessine-293 and -294) both have half-lives under a second, but longer than what was predicted. You are right that it is at best weird and at worst mistaken to talk about the half-life of tennessine without specifying an isotope (and I am only giving it that much because you could easily make a very clichéd exercise out of this). But I will have to think for a moment to find a better way of writing this. Double sharp (talk) 03:56, 27 September 2017 (UTC)

@Lesath: I've edited it to "Tennessine is the second-heaviest element created so far, and all its known isotopes have half-lives. of less than one second. Nevertheless, this is longer than the values predicted prior to their discovery." Is this clearer, or do you think there's anything else that should be improved? Double sharp (talk) 04:01, 27 September 2017 (UTC)

Thanks, @Double sharp:! That is certainly better. Ideally, in my mind, these two sentences would say, for the most stable known isotope, what the predicted and actual half-lives were in milliseconds. I wasn't able to determine that from reading the paper. --✶♏✶ 05:22, 28 September 2017 (UTC)

@Lesath: Sorry for not getting back to this earlier; I must have missed it by accident, and the paper's not always the easiest of reads. I suspect the theoretical values are the blue ones in our diagram of the observed decay chains for ²⁹⁴Ts and ²⁹³Ts shown in the article, but I'll check through the paper again and see if there's anything else it could possibly be referring to before adding them. Thank you for your excellent suggestions, and my sincerest apologies for this inexcusable delay! Double sharp (talk) 03:29, 17 January 2018 (UTC)

@Lesath: Apologies for the inexcusable lateness, but I think the figures I mentioned back in January 2018 are the right ones. The paper gives for ²⁹³Ts and ²⁹⁴Ts the observed lifetimes of 21 ms and 112 ms respectively (black), and the predicted lifetimes 10 ms and 45 ms respectively (blue). To convert these to half-lives we must multiply by ln 2, thus yielding 15 ms and 78 ms (observed) and 6.9 ms and 31 ms (predicted). I've put the lifetimes (predicted and observed) from the discovery paper into the article. Thank you again for raising this issue and I apologise again for being this inexcusably late! Double sharp (talk) 15:15, 20 June 2019 (UTC)

Facts

What facts do we know about Ts other than its predicted properties? UB Blacephalon (talk) 06:33, 12 January 2020 (UTC)

@Blacephalon: To the best of my knowledge, we know nothing other some some decay data. That there is extremely little data is something Wikipedia writers (including myself) tend to view as self-evident, and this causes these questions. Since you were interested enough to ask this question, may I ask you to see the second paragraph of Hassium#Predicted properties? Do you think this kind of notice would have been enough to answer a question like this if you were reading that article? If so, it may be necessary for a push to add this message to all superheavy element articles.--R8R (talk) 08:31, 12 January 2020 (UTC)

@R8R: Honestly, I think that that type of simple data can help a lot of people get their basic facts straight about SHE. It's only a matter of time before we learn new stuff about it. UB Blacephalon (talk) 18:09, 12 January 2020 (UTC)

Great. As soon as there's a worthy citation for this, I'll add that to all transactinide articles.--R8R (talk) 14:10, 13 January 2020 (UTC)

Thanks! UB Blacephalon (talk) 18:09, 14 January 2020 (UTC)

@Double sharp and ComplexRational: Do you think you know a good citation for that paragraph? I just looked through our Haire source and there's nothing worthy in it (other than this citation on the opening page: "The experimental studies of chemical properties are especially challenging because of the low production rates and the short half‐lives and the need for very special facilities and the use of atom‐at‐a‐time chemistry. The discovery of a new element must furnish evidence that its atomic number is different from those of all the currently known elements and first claims to discovery often lacked such positive identification." Unfortunately, that's not enough). I will give it some thought in a couple of weeks myself, but maybe you can think of something.--R8R (talk) 20:17, 14 January 2020 (UTC)

I added that text throughout article on elements 104--118. If someone checks after me that I haven't made a mistake in describing the state of affairs of an element, I'll be grateful.--R8R (talk) 16:13, 30 January 2020 (UTC)

Thank you for these additions. I looked through all of them had to correct a few grammatical things, namely uses of pronouns and "the" (see my edits) as well as a copy-and-paste error. They should be okay now. ComplexRational (talk) 01:29, 31 January 2020 (UTC)

Well maybe that might be so, but saying true facts, even if they apply to all SHE, are still better than saying could be, would be, or should be. I see those as very confused and not sure if its even true. UB Blacephalon (talk) 16:38, 29 January 2020 (UTC)

Surely it is encyclopaedic to describe what is expected, when it appears in many reliable sources? Physics has come before chemistry in the discoveries of all elements from 102 onwards, so the computational chemists have always had to come up with calculations of what experimentalists should try to look for. I don't disagree that we might certainly be clearer about the fact that these are predictions, with a standard paragraph disclaimer for all of this, but cutting all of it out seems entirely wrong. Double sharp (talk) 16:51, 29 January 2020 (UTC)

Then separate them into facts, predictions and maybe future studies so its not confusing. I've also seen on other sites that say Ts-291 and Ts-292. if you want me to link the page I can. UB Blacephalon (talk) 05:09, 20 July 2020 (UTC)

How is it confusing? The section is titled "Predicted properties" and it starts with these words: "No properties of tennessine or its compounds have been measured; this is due to its extremely limited and expensive production and the fact that it decays very quickly. Properties of tennessine remain unknown and only predictions are available." There are no facts and no planned future studies worth mentioning.

As for other isotopes, from what I've seen, they are less stable than then two we're currently mentioning and the title says "most stable isotopes." It may be worth it to update isotopes of tennessine if there is a reliable source on this (I've only seen this site, but its data is questionable), but no changes are needed here.--R8R (talk) 09:01, 20 July 2020 (UTC)

Well, if your not a nerd like us, a lot of the words wouldn't really make sense. Like for instance "Have been measured" (How can something we have no info about be measured). It's just too wordy.

I'll appreciate it if you write down all instances where our (probably my) writing is too wordy. I'm all for readability myself even if my English might not be crispy enough sometimes. In that particular sentence, however, it seems fine? "No properties of tennessine or its compounds have been measured" -- I think this is fairly easy to follow?

As for the isotopes, that's the site I was talking about and, If they have they data for Ts-291 and Ts-292, then I agree the we should put it in if it's reliable enough. Although it is questionable, like I said I still think we should put it in. After all isotopes are isotopes, right? UB Blacephalon (talk) 18:16, 20 July 2020 (UTC)

One thing is that information should be reliable. That site doesn't appear particularly convincing. Where did their information ultimately come from? I don't know. This article has a bronze star, that's a particular indicator of high quality, and we can't betray it just like that. Also, even if the information were true, we still don't normally make lists of all isotopes, just those of the most stable ones, and the isotopes in question, even if existent, are not very stable compared to 293 and 294.--R8R (talk) 19:32, 20 July 2020 (UTC)

@R8R and Blacephalon: Neither ²⁹¹Ts nor ²⁹²Ts have been reported—there are predictions only—unless there is a very recent publication of which I am unaware. All up-to-date reliable sources give the only two known isotopes as ²⁹³Ts and ²⁹⁴Ts; I've seen some of these websites and they are speculation. The site linked indeed does not give correct values for some known isotopes (for example, ²⁷⁸Mt, among many others), so I wouldn't use it. As such, the article is correct as it is, and no changes to its data are necessary. ComplexRational (talk) 22:41, 20 July 2020 (UTC)

Yeah, I wouldn't either but we really should make a list of all isotopes, although we should be really careful of what we put on it, right? UB Blacephalon (talk) 01:16, 21 July 2020 (UTC)

Collaboration

The main article states the collaboration consisted of JINR, ORNL, Vanderbilt, and Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL). However, TS Program includes the following institutions: JINR, ORNL, Vanderbilt, The University of Tennessee, LLNL, The Research Institute for Advanced Reactors (Russia), and University of Nevada, Las Vegas. I suggest these be the list of collaborating institutions in the main article.

Bryan MacKinnon (talk) 21:44, 1 June 2023 (UTC)

Tennesine-297?

It says that the decay chain of both Ts-293 and Ts-294 come from Ts-297. If that's the case, why isn't Ts-297 a known isotope? UB Blacephalon (talk) 22:29, 18 October 2023 (UTC)

That is because Ts-297 is only produced momentarily as an excited compound nucleus; its de-excitation results in the evaporation of several neutrons, leading to Ts-293 and Ts-294. ^Complex/_Rational 14:20, 19 October 2023 (UTC)

Alright, but shouldn't the fact that it's part of the decay chain make it an official isotope? UB Blacephalon (talk) 17:37, 19 October 2023 (UTC)

No, since Ts-297 is never produced as a ground-state isotope, and neutron evaporation is not a decay mode. ^Complex/_Rational 12:33, 20 October 2023 (UTC)

What about it being a Metastable element? How did the neutrons evaporate, and why does it have to be a ground state? UB Blacephalon (talk) 03:08, 23 October 2023 (UTC)

It's a compound nucleus, with too much energy to remain bound and too short a lifetime to be considered a nuclide. This energy is carried away by the "evaporated" neutrons. The linked article explains it in greater detail. ^Complex/_Rational 21:14, 23 October 2023 (UTC)

Interesting. So why isn't it a Metastable element? UB Blacephalon (talk) 21:39, 23 October 2023 (UTC)