Tennessee to be honored on periodic table of elements

June 8, 2016 at 5:50 p.m. | Updated June 8, 2016 at 6:00 p.m.

by Associated Press

ADDS HAMILTON WAS PART OF A TEAM - Physics professor, and lifelong fan of the Los Angeles Dodgers and Brooklyn Dodgers, Joe Hamilton poses in his Dodgers cap in his office at Vanderbilt University Wednesday, June 8, 2016, in Nashville, Tenn. Hamilton, was part of a team that discovered a new element and named tennessine after Tennessee, making it the second element named after a state. Californium is the first. (AP Photo/Mark Humphrey)
ADDS HAMILTON WAS PART OF A TEAM - Physics professor, and lifelong fan of the Los Angeles Dodgers and Brooklyn Dodgers, Joe Hamilton poses in his Dodgers cap in his office at Vanderbilt University Wednesday, June 8, 2016, in Nashville, Tenn. Hamilton, was part of a team that discovered a new element and named tennessine after Tennessee, making it the second element named after a state. Californium is the first. (AP Photo/Mark Humphrey)

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) - Tennessee will soon be the second state honored on the periodic table of elements.

The International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry on Wednesday recommended the names of four recently discovered elements that are now only known by numbers. The proposed name for element 117 is tennessine, (TEH'-neh-seen) in honor of the contributions of the Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Vanderbilt University and the University of Tennessee to the development of super heavy elements.

California was the first state to be named after an element.

Vanderbilt physics Professor Joe Hamilton, a member of the international team that developed the new element, said it's been a long time coming. Hamilton said team members were all in agreement that the new element should be named for the Volunteer State.

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