From: rparson@spotNO.SPAMColorado.edu (Robert Parson)
Newsgroups: sci.chem
Subject: Re: [Q] What is the strongest acid?
Date: 14 May 1999 20:02:27 GMT

In article <373972E2.B693D523@worldnet.att.net>,
Eric Lucas  <ealucas@worldnet.att.net> wrote:
>Superdave the Wonderchemist wrote:

>> Just take element number 112 and strip 112 electrons off it, then you'd
>> have the strongest Lewis acid...
>
>Just take element 113...  Oh, never mind.

 Actually the real fun should begin somewhere around atomic number 137.
 That's where Quantum Electrodynamic effects (spontaneous production
 of electon-positron pairs and suchlike) should start to appear. (The
 smallness parameter for QED is the fine-structure constant, \alpha
 ~1/137, so multiplying by a nuclear charge of 137 brings these up to
 order 1.) A species that can pull an electron out of the _vacuum_
 has gotta count as one hell of a Lewis acid!

 ------
 Robert