Nihonium

Nihonium (Nh) — 10-Year Trends

As of 2026-09-25 · the last 10 years

Research intensity has climbed to about 89% of the element's own all-time peak, a peak that occurred in 1972, well before this window.

Research intensity ran from about 29% of the element's own all-time peak in 2016 to about 89% in 2026 — a net rise with setbacks along the way, and the all-time peak (1972) lies before this window. The trajectory is an uneven climb, with fluctuations visible in the yearly data but a clear upward trend over the decade. Among the 118 elements, nihonium has one of the smaller research literatures of any element.

The number of papers involving the element rose from about 10 in 2016 to about 24 in 2025 (2.4x). That matches the growth of the literature as a whole over the same years: the general tide of scientific output, not a surge specific to the element.

The research is dominated by a single community: Superheavy Nuclei, Heavy-Ion Collisions, and Nuclear Structure. This group accounts for about 94% of nihonium's recent research, a share that has remained steady over the last two five-year periods. Nihonium is a minor presence in this much larger community, with under 1% of its papers involving nihonium. The work focuses on element synthesis and uncovering chemical homology with elements close to nihonium, such as astatine. Key papers include a 2024 study in Frontiers in Chemistry on relativistic effects in nihonium and moscovium, cited about 19 times, and a 2023 Nature Communications paper on heavy nuclei fusion, cited about 25 times.

A smaller, rising community is Wide-Bandgap Semiconductor Devices for Power Electronics, Optoelectronics and Sensing, which now holds about 6% of the element's recent research, up from 0% in the previous period. Nihonium is also a minor presence here, with under 1% of its papers involving the element. The only paper in this community within the window is a 2025 study in Calphad on thermodynamic properties of nihonium nitride, cited once.

A third community, Manganese Oxide Geochemistry and Thallium Removal from Water and Soil, held about 5% of the research in the earlier period but has dropped to 0% in the current period. The single paper associated with this group is a 2019 report from Texas A&M University on liquid phase chemistry of indium and thallium, cited once.

The window's most-cited paper, belonging to the superheavy nuclei community, is the 2016 IUPAC recommendation on names and symbols for elements 113, 115, 117, and 118, cited about 99 times.

For a deeper look at nihonium's current standing, see its Last 12 Months report or Executive Brief.