You interact with about two-thirds of the elements of the periodic table every day. Some, like carbon, oxygen, and nitrogen, make up our bodies and the air we breathe.

Yet there is also a class of elements so unstable they can only be made in a lab.

These superheavy elements are the purview of a small group stretching the boundaries of chemistry. Can they extend the periodic table beyond the 118 in it now?

Find out scientists are using particle accelerators to create element 120 and why they’ve skipped over element 119.

Plus, if an element exists for only a fraction of a second in the lab, can we still say that counts as existing?