Q 01/05

What is plutonium's chemical symbol?

A) Pt

B) Pu

C) Pl

D) Pn

Answer · why

B) Pu

Pu: the team leader picked the letters as a joke about a bad smell, expecting to be overruled, but nobody objected and the symbol became official.

Q 02/05

What is plutonium's atomic number?

A) 88

B) 92

C) 96

D) 94

Answer · why

D) 94

It is the element with the highest atomic number known to occur in nature.

Q 03/05

Plutonium is named for Pluto, which in turn takes its name from the Roman god of what?

A) The oceans

B) The heavens

C) The underworld

D) The harvest

Answer · why

C) The underworld

The underworld: the name simply continued a run of planet-named elements, yet a god of the dead proved a grimly fitting namesake for the metal of the ...

Q 04/05

Where was plutonium first synthesised, in 1940-41?

A) Berkeley, California

B) Chicago, Illinois

C) New York City

D) Princeton, New Jersey

Answer · why

A) Berkeley, California

Berkeley, California: the university's laboratory went on to find so many new elements that two of them, berkelium and californium, carry the names of...

Q 05/05

Which chemist led the team that first produced and identified plutonium?

A) Glenn T. Seaborg

B) Otto Hahn

C) Enrico Fermi

D) Ernest Lawrence

Answer · why

A) Glenn T. Seaborg

Glenn T. Seaborg: he broke the news of two further elements on a children's radio quiz show in 1945, days before the formal announcement, after a youn...