Californium most dangerous if taken into the body. In addition, californium-249 and californium-251 can cause tissue damage externally, through gamma ray emission. Ionizing radiation emitted by californium on bone and in the liver can cause cancer. Californium Californium is a radioactive chemical element with symbol Cf and atomic number 98. The element was first synthesized in 1950 at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (then the University of California Radiation Laboratory), by bombarding curium with alpha particles (helium-4 ions). It is an actinide element, the sixth transuranium element to be synthesized, and has the second-highest atomic mass of all the elements that
Californium Dubna, Russia, as the product of bombardment of californium-249 with calcium-48, making it the heaviest element ever synthesized. The target for this experiment contained about 10 mg of californium-249 deposited on a titanium foil of 32 cm area. Californium has also been used to produce other transuranium elements; for example, element 103 (later named lawrencium) was first synthesized in 1961 by bombarding californium with boron nuclei. Californium that bioaccumulates in skeletal tissue releases radiation that disrupts the body's ability to form red blood cells. The element plays no natural biological role in any organism due to its intense radioactivity and