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Atoms of a new super-heavy element - 'element 117' - have reportedly been created by German scientists.

Element 117 - also temporarily named ununseptium - is so called because it is an atom with 117 protons in its nucleus. These super-heavy elements are the ones beyond atomic number 104 and are not found naturally on Earth and thus have to be created synthetically within a laboratory.

Uranium with 92 protons is the heaviest element that is found naturally however scientists can artificially create heavier elements by adding proton into an atomic nucleus through nuclear fusion reactions.

Over the years, researchers have created heavier and heavier elements in hopes of discovering just how large atoms can be, said Christoph Düllmann, a professor at the Institute for Nuclear Chemistry at Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz.

"There are predictions that super-heavy elements should exist which are very long-lived," Düllmann told Live Science. "It is interesting to find out if half-lives become long again for very heavy elements, especially if very neutron-rich species are made."

According to various reports element 117 was first reported in 2010 by a team of American and Russian scientists working together at the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research in Dubna, Russia. Since then, researchers have been performing subsequent tests to confirm the existence of the elusive new element.

"The successful experiments on element 117 are an important step on the path to the production and detection of elements situated on the 'island of stability' of super-heavy elements," Horst Stöcker, scientific director at the GSI Helmholtz Center for Heavy Ion Research, said in a statement.

Findings of the study are published in the journal Physical Review Letters.