What is Einsteinium atom?

   

 Einsteinium is a synthetic element with the symbol Es and atomic number 99.  As a member of the actinide series, it is the seventh transuranic element.

     Einsteinium was discovered as a component of the debris of the first hydrogen bomb explosion in 1952, and named after Albert Einstein.  Its most common isotope einsteinium 253(half-life 20.47 days) is produced artificially from decay of californium-253 in a few dedicated high-power nuclear reactors with a total  yield on the order of one milligram per year.  The reactor synthesis is followed by a complex process of separating einsteinium-253 from other isotopes are synthesized in various laboratories, but in much smaller amounts, by bombarding heavy actinide elements with light ions.  Owing to the small amounts of produced einsteinium and the short half-life of its most easily produced isotope, there are currently almost no practical applications for it outside basic scientific research.  

     Einsteinium is a soft, silvery, paramagnetic metal.  Its chemistry is typical of the late actinides, with a preponderance of the +3 oxidation state; the +2 oxidation state is also accessible, especially in solids.  The high radioactivity of einsteinium-253 produces a visible glow and rapidly damages its crystalline metal lattice, with released hear of about 1000 watts per gram.  Difficulty in studying its properties is due to einsteinium-253's decay to berkelium-249 and then californium-249 at a rate of about 3% per day.  

     The isotope of einsteinium with longest half-life, einsteinium-252 (half life 471.7 days) would be more suitable for investigation of physical properties, but it has proven far more difficult to produce and is available only in minute quantities in its pure form, and this was the common short-lived isotope einsteinium-253.