The plutonium-244 hints at how heavy metals form in stars. When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. Here’s how it works. A rare version of the radioactive ...

The rare form of the element found on the Pacific seabed points to its violent birth in colliding stars. By William J. Broad Scientists studying a sample of oceanic crust retrieved from the Pacific ...

A team of scientists has discovered a new, stable form of plutonium – and done so by accident. The famously unstable element is tricky to transport, store and dispose of, but the find could lead to ...

A byproduct of aging nuclear weapons stockpiles could help power spacecraft on missions lasting decades. Americium-241, an isotope that can be separated from aged plutonium, is being studied as a ...

Elements that do not exist in nature—that have been created in a laboratory—are unstable. After hours or days of one element bombarding another with enough energy for both to fuse, the resulting new ...

Oxidation is the process where atoms lose electrons during a chemical reaction. Among the radioactive elements, neptunium and plutonium are much harder to oxidize than uranium. To study these elements ...

In the early decades of the atomic age, using the enormous energy in plutonium atoms for the peaceful generation of electricity became a multibillion-dollar quest that shaped US energy research and ...

James is a published author with multiple pop-history and science books to his name. He specializes in history, space, strange science, and anything out of the ordinary.View full profile James is a ...

Traces of rare forms of iron and plutonium have been found at the bottom of the Pacific Ocean, after some kind of cataclysm in outer space created this radioactive stuff and sent it raining down on ...