Chemical element universe's 94 naturally occurring chemical elements are thought to have been produced by at least four cosmic processes. Most of the hydrogen, helium and a very small quantity of lithiumin the universe was produced primordially in the first few minutes of the Big Bang. Other three recurrently occurring later processes are thought to have produced the remaining elements. Stellar nucleosynthesis, an ongoing process inside stars, produces all elements from carbon through iron in atomic number, but little lithium, beryllium, or boron. Elements heavier in atomic number than iron, as heavy as uranium and plutonium, are produced by explosive nucleosynthesis in
Transuranium element found. Transuranium elements may be utilized to synthesize other super-heavy elements. Elements of the island of stability have potential important military applications, including the development of compact nuclear weapons. The potential every-day applications are vast; the element americium is utilized in devices like smoke detectors and spectrometers. Transuranium element The transuranium elements (also known as transuranic elements) are the chemical elements with atomic numbers greater than 92, which is the atomic number of uranium. All of these elements are unstable and decay radioactively into other elements. Of the elements with atomic numbers 1 to 92, most can be found in