A team of German physicists has discovered a new chemical element, atomic number 111, which is reported to have survived for less than 2,000th of a second.

The research team, led by Siguard Hofman of Gesellschaft fuer Schwerionenforschung at Darmstadt, Germany, created the new element by bombarding the metal bismuth with a beam of nickel atoms. Only 3 atoms of the element were released, which then quickly decayed into various lighter atoms by emitting radiation.