Electronic structure of eka-lead (element 114) compared with lead

The electronic level structure of eka-lead (element 114), the synthesis of which was reported last year, is studied by the recently developed intermed iate Hamiltonian Fock-space coupled-cluster method. Very large basis sets a re used, with l up to 8, and 36 electron are correlated. The accuracy of th e resulting transition energies is tested by applying the same method to Pb ; calculated ionization potentials and excitation energies agree with exper iment within a few hundredths of an eV, and similar accuracy is expected fo r the heavier element. Ionization potentials and excitation energies of E11 4 are considerably higher than for Pb, due to the relativistic stabilizatio n of the 7s and 7p(1/2) orbitals. This indicates that eka-lead will probabl y be more inert and less metallic than lead. (C) 2001 American Institute of Physics.