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Un-Un-Pentium On Your Periodic Table of the Elements?
PolygamousRanchKid writes, quoting Forbes "Researchers at Sweden's Lund University have announced that they've been able to confirm the existence of element 115 on the periodic table. This research team isn't the first to create element 115, which is currently known as ununpentium. The first claim that ununpentium had been synthesized in a lab was by a joint group of Russian and American researchers, who believed that they created it in their lab in 2004."
If you want to make a lot of stupid jokes about the Pentium chip, don't worry, they were already made 10 years ago in the other Slashdot article
It's good for getting closer to the predicted island of stability, where stable (and usable) elements may exists.
It's also good for satisfying human curiosity (which in itself is a worthy goal) and being a catalyst for inventing new technology that may be of practical value already.
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Understanding the world around us? You know, sciency stuff.
Nobody is going to make you a car out of this, but some of these 'exotic' materials they need to create in a lab can tell us some interesting things about the early universe.
Since when do we need a specific reason to do science? You never know what you'll find out once you've done the research.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
Un-un-pentium is element 114.999997