The name. Unonoctium comes from ununoctium, the old placeholder name for element 118, now called oganesson, the heaviest element yet made and the one sitting at the very far edge of the periodic table. The name oganesson honors the American-Armenian Yuri Oganessian, nuclear physicist. It is an element that barely exists, synthesized a few atoms at a time and gone in an instant, a marker of the boundary between the known and the not-yet-reached. 1110110 is the same idea in another language: binary for 118.

The balloon. A balloon is the upward impulse made into an object. It is curiosity that has decided to leave the ground, lightness reaching toward open and uncertain space. But a balloon is also the most uncomplicated kind of joy there is, the first wonder of childhood, the thing a child reaches for and laughs at and lets go just to watch it climb. That delight is not separate from the science and exploration; it is their main driver. The pull to follow a question up into the unknown is the same pull that makes a child crane their neck to watch a balloon disappear into the blue, the same open-mouthed where does it go. It is fragile and untethered on purpose.

Yellow. Yellow is the color you notice, warmth and energy and the thing that catches the eye in a field of everything else. It is the brightness of attention itself, the small point of light that says look here.

All together. A yellow balloon drawn as a network, named for the far edge of the periodic table: one image, the bright, buoyant, childlike pull towards exploration and joy.