Superheavy oganesson is a semiconductor

The electronic structure of oganesson, also known as element 118, suggests it is a semiconductor, breaking from the trend seen in all other noble gases and continuing to suggest the end of periodicity. Researchers led by chemist Peter Schwerdtfeger from Massey University in New Zealand have used state-of-the-art models to predict oganesson’s band gaps, calibrating their model against the known gaps for the other noble gases from neon to xenon. While these noble gases are insulators with electronic gaps ranging from 21.51eV to 9.32eV, the team predict oganesson’s band gap to be around 1.5eV, suggesting it is a metallic semiconductor.