Elements / Laws of Physics / Other Solar Systems

[omniflow]

Apologies if this question has been raised before.

I saw a news article a few days ago regarding an asteroid having a nickel / iron core, and that got me thinking.

We, as in earth based scientists, have mapped out the periodic table of the elements, and this follows the laws of physics as we understand them. As far as I can gather, this means that we have discovered every element in the lower table that it is ever possible to discover, and that any new elements will be off the end of the table, and therefore very different / complex / useless in composition.

Does this mean that any alien lifeform on a distant planet in a distant galaxy will have exactly the same elements at their disposal, or is it possible that the distant galaxy has a completely different set of laws of physics that would mean the elements at their disposal were completely different. Or, is it possible that there are some elements within "missing blocks" within out our periodic table.

If I knew more about this than rather out-dated schoolboy physics, I might be able to pose a more thorough question. So if I have left gaps, please assume that they are left as a result of ignorance and fill them in as you see fit.

[Eric Mc]

There is no room in the table to "squeeze in" elements between the 92 natural ones. Them's it.

[anonymous-user]

Eric Mc said:

There is no room in the table to "squeeze in" elements between the 92 natural ones. Them's it.

This.

Elements are defined by the number of protons on their nucleus. 1 for hydrogen, 2 for helium, 3 for boron, and so on. Something with 6 protons will always be carbon; the number of neutrons in the nucleus determines what isotope of carbon it is.

There are not any “gaps”. We’ve identified each element with a distinct number of protons in the nucleus up to 118 or so (some of higher ones are artificially made). The periodic table is laid out in a U-shape to ground elements that have similar properties in vertical columns.

[travel is dangerous]

with the same rules of physics only the same elements are available.

If you start tweaking the strong/weak nuclear forces then you could potentially end up in a place where you had other elements available.

Eric is half right - you can't get extra elements in between the existing ones (each atom must obviously have an integer number of protons). But there are 118 elements discovered so far. Although for some of them, as few as 2 atoms have been synthesised and many have very short (<1 second) lifetimes, so it's quite hard to do chemistry with them.

[travel is dangerous]

boron is element number 5, 3 is lithium

[anonymous-user]

travel is dangerous said:

boron is element number 5, 3 is lithium

Quite right. Amazing how stuff that used to be second nature falls out of one’s head.

[Nimby]

We see exactly the same elements in the absorbtion spectrum of light from the most distant galaxies, so we know their fundamental physical constants must be the same as here.

[Eric Mc]

All you need to know -

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U2cfju6GTNs

[travel is dangerous]

Nimby said:

We see exactly the same elements in the absorbtion spectrum of light from the most distant galaxies, so we know their fundamental physical constants must be the same as here.

ooo, nice point