The proposal that the criteria for the discovery of new elements, established 25 years ago by the Transfermium Working Group (TWG) established by IUPAP and IUPAC, be reviewed grew out of discussions started by Natalia Tarasova and Bruce McKellar, the Presidents of IUPAC and IUPAP in 2016. These discussions were driven by a desire to revise the procedures for the Joint Working Parties (JWPs) set up by the Unions for determining claims for the discovery of new elements before any new claims were made. In the course of these discussions it became clear that the criteria for discovery set out previously related to discovery methods which were being replaced by newer methods, and that it would be useful also to revise those criteria before new claims were made.
As a result, the Unions set up a Joint Working Group (JWG) on the criteria for discovery of new elements.
The first meeting of the JWG was in May 2017 and a report prepared by Sigurd Hofmann, Sergey N. Dmitriev, Claes Fahlander, Jacklyn M. Gates, James B. Roberto and Hideyuki Sakai, was submitted to the Presidents of IUPAC and IUPAP May 25, 2018.
In accordance with the Terms of Reference under which the JWG was established, this report has been provisionally accepted by us, and is open for comment for 5 months.
Comments will be accepted up to 31 March 2019.
> Access full text of the IUPAC/IUPAP Provisional Report titled “On the discovery of new elements”
