The image is based on the state flag of California and features a grizzly bear (a symbol of great strength) and a lone star.
| Density | 15.1 |
| Melting Point | 900°C |
| Boiling Point | Unknown |
Californium is a very strong neutron emitter. It is used in portable metal detectors, for identifying gold and silver ores, to identify water and oil layers in oil wells and to detect metal fatigue and stress in aeroplanes.
Californium was first made in 1950 at Berkeley, California, by a team consisting of Stanley Thompson, Kenneth Street Jr., Albert Ghiorso, and Glenn Seaborg. They made it by firing helium nuclei (alpha particles) at curium-242. The process yielded the isotope californium-245 which has a half-life of 44 minutes. Curium is intensely radioactive and it had taken the team three years to collect the few milligrams needed for the experiment, and even so only a few micrograms of this were used. Their endeavours produced around 5,000 atoms of californium, but there was enough to show it really was a new element.