Gas Phase Chemistry of Superheavy Elements

Abstract

The knowledge and understanding of the chemistry of the superheavy elements, especially of the early transactinides Rf, Db, and Sg and their compounds, both experimentally and theoretically, is nowadays quite extensive. While rapid chemical separations in aqueous solution were (and are) the method of choice for detailed investigations of Rf and Db, the development of gas-phase chemical separation methods have allowed first chemical studies of increasingly heavier transactinide elements such as Bh and Hs. In all cases, the separated transactinide element was unequivocally identified by observing the characteristic nuclear decay properties of one of its isotopes. The current paper will review the progress made in gas phase chemical separations of transactinide elements and highlight future perspectives.