Elements
Glenn Seaborg told his students that he proposed the chemical symbol Pu (from P.U.) instead of the conventional "Pl" for plutonium as a joke, only to find it officially adopted. Unununium (Uuu) was the former temporary name of the chemical element number 111, a synthetic transuranium element. This element was named roentgenium (Rg) in November 2004.
Read more about this topic: List Of Chemical Compounds With Unusual Names
Famous quotes containing the word elements:
“It is a life-and-death conflict between all those grand, universal, man-respecting principles which we call by the comprehensive term democracy, and all those partial, person-respecting, class-favoring elements which we group together under that silver-slippered word aristocracy. If this war does not mean that, it means nothing.”
—Antoinette Brown Blackwell (1825–1921)
“In spite of all their kind some elements of worth
With difficulty persist here and there on earth.”
—Hugh MacDiarmid (1892–1978)
“Barbarisation may be defined as a cultural process whereby an attained condition of high value is gradually overrun and superseded by elements of lower quality.”
—Johan Huizinga (1872–1945)