Darmstadtium - 110Ds: historical information
On the 9th of November 1994 at 4:39 pm the first atom of element 110, darmstadtium, was detected at the Gesellschaft für Schwerionenforschung (GSI) in Darmstadt, Germany. The isotope discovered has an atomic number of 269 (that is, 269 times heavier than hydrogen).
The new element was produced by fusing a nickel and a lead atom together. This was achieved by accelerating the nickel atoms to a high energy in the heavy ion accelerator UNILAC at GSI. Over a period of many days, many billion billion nickel atoms were fired at a lead target in order to produce and identify a single atom of darmstadtium.
Darmstadtium was the fourth element discovered at GSI. Between 1981 and 1984 the elements 107 (bohrium), 108 (hassium), 109 (meitnerium) were produced and identified there. Since the discovery of darmstadtium, elements 111 and 112 were both discovered at GSI.