No Added Chemicals

The triple bonded boron compound is stable at room temperature Carbon and nitrogen are well known for their triple bonds, but making stable compounds with a triple bond between two boron atoms hadn’t been achieved despite the computational possibilities. Until now. Holger Braunschweig of the Institute for Inorganic Chemistry at Julius-Maximilians-Universität in Würzburg, Germany, and colleagues found that reacting a bis( N -heterocyclic carbene) stabilised tetrabromodiborane with either two or four equivalents of sodium naphthalenide, a single electron reducing agent, generates a diborene or diboryne compound, which they isolated and characterised. Their analysis confirms a linear, halogen-free compound with a boron-boron triple bond. 1

IUPAC has officially approved the name flerovium, with symbol Fl, for the element of atomic number 114 and the name livermorium, with symbol Lv, for the element of atomic number 116. Priority for the discovery of these elements was assigned, in accordance with the agreed criteria, to the collaboration between the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research (Dubna, Russia) and the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (Livermore, California, USA). The collaborating team has proposed the names flerovium and livermorium which have now been formally approved by IUPAC.