The Periodic Discovery Tool
Use the simplified Start → Stop → Save sequence. The tool runs a default public demonstration route, visually shows the nuclei being combined, and updates the live findings document on the page.
Ready to start
The run sequence visualizes how the proposed nuclei combine, form an excited compound nucleus, and resolve into a candidate isotope.
Organize for deeper review
This idea needs a structured reaction path, literature cross-checking, and experimental realism before it would be worth expert review.
Live Findings Document
The findings document updates on the page. It explains the proposed discovery method, the plain-language meaning of the result, and a theoretical path to recreating the needed environment. It never discusses hidden implementation details.
Highlighting the frontier of the periodic table
New elements are not only additions to a chart. They test nuclear theory, probe the limits of matter, help scientists study shell effects and stability, and deepen our understanding of how extreme nuclei behave.
Element 118 is the confirmed frontier
Oganesson, atomic number 118, is the heaviest confirmed element. That makes 119 and 120 the most visible next targets for extending the table into an eighth period.
Why 119 and 120 matter
These candidates sit at the doorway to a new period. Even a tiny number of verified decay-chain events could reshape how chemists and nuclear physicists think about the far edge of the table.
Island of stability question
One of the most important open questions is whether shell effects may create relatively longer-lived superheavy nuclei. Discovery work helps test that possibility.
Scientific data that frames the search
This website presents concise, public-facing context so visitors understand what makes an element hypothesis plausible, difficult, or likely to fail under experimental scrutiny.
Key scientific signals
| Signal | Why it matters |
|---|---|
| Charge balance | The target and projectile proton counts must add up to the candidate element’s atomic number. |
| Mass balance | The total mass number must support a credible compound nucleus and a realistic neutron-evaporation path. |
| Decay chains | New-element claims typically rely on short sequences of correlated decays matched against known daughter behavior. |
| Half-life window | The isotope must live long enough to leave a measurable signal, even if only for milliseconds. |
| Shell effects | Magic or near-magic proton and neutron numbers may improve survival odds in very heavy nuclei. |
| Production probability | Cross sections can be extraordinarily small, which is why new elements are so difficult to produce and confirm. |
Reference facts for visitors
- The currently confirmed periodic table extends through element 118.
- Temporary systematic names and symbols are used before a discovery claim is formally validated and named.
- Superheavy discovery work often uses fusion-evaporation reactions: a heavy target nucleus is struck by a lighter projectile beam to form an excited compound nucleus.
- That excited nucleus can cool by ejecting one or more neutrons, leaving a candidate isotope.
- Formal recognition requires more than prediction: it requires reproducible, high-quality evidence that stands up to international review.
Institutions pushing the frontier
New-element work is international and facility-dependent. The projects below represent major centers and collaborations involved in superheavy-element or adjacent rare-isotope research.
RIKEN Nishina Center (Japan)
RIKEN has invested in upgraded superheavy-element research infrastructure, including separator capability aimed at new superheavy synthesis. It is widely viewed as one of the most visible efforts targeting element 119.
JINR SHE Factory (Dubna)
The Superheavy Element Factory at JINR supports high-intensity heavy-ion research aimed at the synthesis and study of very heavy nuclei, including long-term ambitions for elements 119 and 120.
GSI / FAIR (Germany)
GSI and the FAIR research environment remain important to heavy-ion physics and future superheavy studies, including work that supports the wider search for extreme nuclei.
FRIB (United States)
FRIB is a leading rare-isotope facility. While its primary mission is broader than element 119 or 120 alone, it contributes essential data, isotope discoveries, and nuclear-structure insight relevant to frontier element science.
ORNL / UTK collaborations
Oak Ridge and university collaborators have participated in research aimed at the synthesis of new superheavy elements and the design of detection systems needed to identify them.
GANIL / SPIRAL2 (France)
French accelerator development also contributes to the wider heavy-ion landscape, including capabilities relevant to beams used in superheavy-element research planning.
How the discovery system works
The website explains the system openly at the scientific-method level. It does not discuss hidden implementation details. Visitors can see the reasoning path from hypothesis to screening outcome.
1. Define the candidate
Choose a proton count and neutron count. This determines the identity of the proposed element and isotope.
2. Propose a fusion route
Specify a target nucleus and a projectile beam that, when combined, could theoretically form the candidate after neutron evaporation.
3. Check physical balance
The system checks whether charge and mass are organized sensibly enough to discuss as a plausible route.
4. Compare with stability clues
The screening considers shell proximity, neutron-to-proton balance, binding-energy behavior, and a simple fissility view to estimate how strained the nucleus may be.
5. Think like an experimentalist
The system asks whether the idea includes decay-chain expectations, half-life thinking, and enough evidence planning to make the theory testable.
6. Write the findings plainly
The final findings document explains the result in plain language, tells the user what the proposed pathway means, and outlines the type of laboratory environment theoretically needed to test it.
Check nuclear data with NuDat 3
Use NuDat 3 from the National Nuclear Data Center to compare known nuclides, decay modes, half-lives, levels, gamma data, and other nuclear-structure information.
NuDat 3 reference check
After running the tool, compare the candidate isotope and expected daughter products against known nuclear data.
What to compare
- Known isotopes near the proposed candidate.
- Expected daughter nuclei after alpha decay or spontaneous fission.
- Half-life windows and decay modes.
- Whether the route conflicts with evaluated nuclear data.
Discovery Archive
Saved and downloaded discoveries are stored locally in this browser. Re-download previous findings from this archive.
Marcus Perkins — veteran, independent learner, and STEM-focused creator
Marcus Perkins is a U.S. Navy Veteran and lifelong independent learner. With only a high school education, he has continued studying in his spare time, building his understanding through curiosity, discipline, and a steady interest in nature, mathematics, science, and how STEM fields intersect.
A short creator story
Marcus Perkins brings a practical, hands-on background shaped by service in the U.S. Navy and years of self-directed learning. His military experience strengthened his respect for systems, discipline, precision, and accountability. Those same traits carried into his personal studies and creative work.
Although his formal education stopped at the high school level, he never stopped learning. In his spare time, he studies ideas across science, nature, mathematics, technology, and problem-solving, using curiosity as the engine for continued growth.
Learning beyond the classroom
This project reflects the path of someone who keeps learning without waiting for permission. Marcus studies STEM-related subjects independently, asks questions, compares patterns, and looks for connections between fields that are usually treated separately.
The focus is not on claiming credentials. The focus is on disciplined curiosity: asking better questions, testing ideas carefully, and building tools that make complex theories easier to think through.
Nature, STEM, and intersectional thinking
Marcus is especially interested in how nature expresses structure: symmetry, growth, cycles, balance, decay, force, energy, and transformation. Those ideas appear across biology, chemistry, physics, mathematics, and engineering.
The Periodic Discovery Tool grew from that interest in intersections. It asks whether patterns from one field can help organize questions in another field, especially when thinking about atoms, elements, equations, and discovery pathways.
How the theory evolved
Questioning AI about mathematical overlap
The starting point was repeated questioning about whether the cross section of mathematical equations could be mapped onto atoms and used to compare relationships between different scientific fields.
Mapping equations onto atomic thinking
The theory then explored whether equations could be viewed through atomic-style properties: interaction, structure, balance, transformation, and compatibility.
Conceptual fusion of equations
This led to the idea that equations with similar properties could conceptually fuse, producing new interdisciplinary equations or revealing relationships that were not obvious when each field was studied alone.
Applying the framework to element discovery
That broader thinking was redirected toward the periodic table, creating a public tool that visually organizes possible element-discovery pathways and explains them in plain language.
Guiding philosophy
Patterns can inspire discovery, but evidence must decide it. The purpose of the site is to support organized scientific thinking, not unsupported claims. The tool keeps the scientific method at the center by focusing on hypothesis testing, visual discovery paths, falsification, and plain-language explanation.
Contact the creator
Use the form below to send questions, collaboration inquiries, or feedback about the public scientific framework.
What this website is designed to do
- Help users organize a new element theory.
- Promote scientific-method thinking.
- Show which nuclei are being combined in the proposed pathway.
- Explain, in plain language, what the candidate result means.
- Point visitors toward the international scientific context of discovery.
To personalize the contact flow, replace the default contact email before publishing the site.