A graduate student in chemistry needs to secure the goodwill of a faculty member he has antagonized in order to feel confident in passing his orals, and the faculty member has asked as the price of his goodwill that the student identify the unique chemical element of whose name he was thinking.

This is actually fairly nice for anybody moderately familiar with the periodical table (such as people who have read a very nice book called Building Blocks of the Universe by some guy whose name I’ve forgotten). The backstory would have been believable even if Asimov didn’t go out of his way in the afterword to let us know that it’s pretty close to true and based on his own experiences as a graduate student. I rather like this one.

Found In

	The Edge of Tomorrow
	Puzzles of the Black Widowers