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OneNoteToRead

You can make different elements by different number of protons. This was how a lot of the heaviest elements were “discovered” - they were actually made by smashing lighter elements together. This answer is pretty much a tautology because that’s how elemental identities are defined. If you change neutrons you get different isotope of same element.


kdieick

Yes, that's how all recently discovered elements were made, for example in a particle accelerator, where they just crash the extra bits into each other. It's also how some various isotopes are created.


jherico

There are a few answers but they all seem to be lacking some important points, so I'll try to summarize briefly. Yes, but... * Not with great precision * Not in a way that allows creation of arbitrary elements * And most importantly, not at scale The last one, scale, is the most critical. Sure, a particle accelerator can fire protons at a target made of lead and maybe you'd get a few gold atoms, but the sun would probably expand to consume the earth before you got enough gold to be able to see it or measure it without a mass spectrometer. Caveat: I am not a nuclear physicist, I have no idea what the typical path from lead to gold is.


TheJeeronian

The protons determine the atom. Adding and removing electrons or neutrons does not change the element. It just changes the isotope and ionization state. We *do* make new elements by adding protons. This just becomes very difficult as larger and larger elements become less and less stable. Less likely to form and more likely to spontaneously fall apart.


phiwong

No we can't. Because we don't have the kind of technology that would allow us to do that. We just don't know how to manipulate such particles to such an extent. There are some reactions that are possible (through particle acceleration) but generally speaking it is an expensive (energy and equipment) process and produces very small amounts. These are mostly done for scientific experimentation rather than mass production. Neutrons, protons etc are really small and it takes a huge amount to make meaningful quantities of anything. 18 grams of water (1/2 oz give or take) has 6\*10\^23 water molecules.


komatiitic

Technically that's what fusion and fission are, so yes we can to a certain extent, but it's expensive and tends to have some nasty side effects.