For millennia, alchemists sought to turn lead into gold. They thought it could be done by mixing the "elements" (fire, water, earth, and air) or the "primes" (sulfur, mercury, and salt) in different ratios. Today we know that this will not work, and instead, nuclear physics is needed. Using particle accelerators, scientists have turned mercury, bismuth, and lead into gold. Find out how on this episode, and learn why we don't do it more often.

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Intro/Outro/Interlude music: "Neon Laser Horizon" Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com) Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 4.0 License http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Sources: ("Transmutation of Mercury by Fast Neutrons." Physical Review, 60(7), 473–479. DOI: 10.1103/PhysRev.60.473)

Morrissey, D. J., Lee, D., Bredel, K. J., Crowley, B. J., Loveland, W., & Seaborg, G. T. (1980). "Target residue mass distributions from the reaction of 8.0-GeV 20Ne with 209Bi." Physical Review C, 21(5), 1783–1798.

ALICE Collaboration. (2025). "Electromagnetic dissociation of relativistic lead ions producing gold isotopes in ultra-peripheral collisions at the LHC." Physics Letters B

Inghram, M. G., Hess, D. C., & Hayden, R. J. (1947). "Neutron Cross Sections for Mercury Isotopes." Physical Review, 71(8), 561.

Wiens, J. H. (1946). "The Production of 198Hg by Neutron Bombardment of Gold." Physical Review, 70(11-12), 910. (Followed by Meggers, Wiens, & Alvarez, 1948, "The Isotope 198Hg as a Primary Standard of Wave Length", Journal of Research of the National Bureau of Standards).