system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
ELI5: Why we have only 118 elements in periodic table?

I've read somewhere, that we're currently limited by technology. But is it teoretically possible to create element with 119 or more protons? If yes, could you please ELI5 what would it take to make such atoms?
gpt
All of the naturally occurring elements have been discovered, the newer ones with high atomic numbers were created for very brief fragments of time in large colliders by firing small packets of protons and neutrons at atoms of larger naturally occurring elements.  They then use special instruments to detect and record the creation of these new elements.  However, the atoms of the newly synthesized elements are very unstable and breakdown to elements with smaller atomic numbers within fractions of a second.


It is theoretically possible to one day synthesize other, larger elements, but that would likely require a whole new technology.