More info:
Dubnium is a superheavy synthetic element that does not occur in nature. The Joint Institute for Nuclear Research in Dubna, Russia, first claimed to have discovered the element in 1968; the element was formally named dubnium after the town of Dubna in 1997. As with all of the superheavy synthetic elements, dubnium is highly radioactive and unstable, meaning that opportunities for research involving the element are very limited. However, as the longest-lived isotopes of dubnium have a half-life of about 1 day, some research into properties of dubnium has been carried out. These studies suggest the element behaves most like niobium. The study of superheavy elements like this is useful as it gives an insight into why some nuclei are more stable than others.
More info about the International Year of the Periodic Table (IYPT) in crystals project:
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