New Form Of Oxygen Observed For The First Time

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Scientists have observed a previously unknown form of oxygen, and the way it behaves may challenge existing theories about "magic numbers," which are derived from nuclear physics.

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Researchers have identified a specific type of oxygen, namely oxygen-28, which contains 20 neutrons. A team of scientists at the Radioactive Isotope Beam Factory has successfully created both oxygen-27 and oxygen-28 for the first time.

They achieved this by first bombarding a calcium-48 isotope with a beryllium ball. This resulted in lighter atoms, which had fewer protons and neutrons than the original element. Scientists then isolated fluorine-29 from the lighter atoms and collided it with liquid hydrogen, which dislodged the proton necessary to create oxygen-28.

However, the scientists got a surprise when oxygen-28 suddenly decayed into another isotope, challenging one of the fundamental assumptions about the stability of atoms in nuclear physics.

Elementary particles in an atom have "magic numbers". This is when the number of protons or neutrons reaches a threshold called the nuclear shell, providing stability to the atom. When an atom has both a magic number of protons and a magic number of neutrons, it's considered to be "doubly magic". A well-established example of this is oxygen-16, the most commonly found type of oxygen on Earth.

There is supposed to be a surplus of stability in atoms with eight protons and twenty neutrons, but oxygen-28 defied expectations by being unstable, which suggests that having twenty neutrons is not a guarantee of stability. This could account for why it has been so hard to find and observe oxygen-28.

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Researchers who studied oxygen-28 suggested more research should involve looking at the atomic nucleus at a higher energy level, which could help clarify why 20 might not actually be a number of stability.

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An earlier version of this article was originally posted in August 2023 .