From bohrium to copernicium and beyond SHE research at SHIP

Heavy-element research with SHIP at GSI is reviewed including the discovery of the chemical elements bohrium to copernicium, experimental developments, cold fusion of heavy ions, and the discovery of a shell region around hassium. Elements bohrium and heavier are located beyond the limit of liquid-drop stability. They exist by shell stabilization. A universal, sensitive, and fast method: in-flight separation and identification of single atomic nuclei has been developed with the velocity filter SHIP and the detector system to measure decay sequences of individual atoms. Research with single atomic nuclei including detection methods, identification, and physics results will be discussed. Experiments with actinide targets as well as prospects with NUSTAR at FAIR will be addressed.