Element 118 is here

Or actually, it was here. For all of 1-1000th of a second.

The New York Times is reporting that "a team of Russian and American scientists said yesterday that it had created the heaviest element ever seen in a laboratory, a dab of matter that lasted for less than one-thousandth of a second but would add an entry at the farthest reaches of the periodic table and suggest that strange new elements may lie beyond."

Awesome. "Element 118." They had better not name it anything else, because you can't get much cooler than "Element 118." I guess "Element X" would be cooler, but I believe that was already coined by the nefarious villain Dr. Who is the classic Toho Studios production "King Kong Escapes." That's the one where the good Doctor creates a giant mechanical ape to dig said radioactive material out the antarctic ice so that he can sell it to the highest bidder on the international black market. Why build a giant mechanical ape to do this, you ask? Fool! You lack vision! Because if you're going to go through the trouble of making a giant, walking robot to do your bidding, you might as well go that extra mile and give it the face of a gorilla. It's what seperates the the artisan from the mere journeyman.

In the very near future Element 118 will be refined and ready
for use in various consumer-based applications, such as providing
fuel for a fleet of giant, labor-saving gorilla robots.

I'm also pretty interested in the quote referring to the farthest reaches of the periodic table suggesting that "strange new elements may lie beyond." I suspect they are referring to Flubber, or possibly a higher grade of Silly Putty that is safe to eat. Time will tell.

Thanks to Boing Boing for the link.