Californium

//ˌkælɪˈfɔɹniəm// noun

noun ·Rare ·Advanced level

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    A strongly radioactive and highly fissile transuranic chemical element (symbol Cf) with an atomic number of 98. uncountable
  2. 2
    a radioactive transuranic element; discovered by bombarding curium with alpha particles wordnet

Example

More examples

"Californium is a chemical element denoted by the symbol Cf."

Etymology

From California + -ium. The element was first synthesized at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (then the University of California Radiation Laboratory), thus named after the university and the U.S. state of California.

Related phrases

Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.