Talk:Island of stability/Archive 1

Confirm Dubnium
An isotope dubnium-262 is listed, although the Dubnium wiki page makes no mention of this isotope.

Proton Numbers
Where are those proton numbers from? lysdexia 09:15, 19 Oct 2004 (UTC)


 * Proton numbers are elements' atomic number netdragon 27 July 2006 (UTC)

Other, not transuranic elements on the island of stability
I think I read about a few (approx. four) other (not transuranic) elements as well which had extremely stabile isotopes. One of them was lead, but I don't remember the rest. Now I've found a reference of "Lead-208" which "seems to be virtually eternal" (see ). It would be good to find the others as well.

Adam78 06:18, 2 Jun 2005 (UTC)


 * Every non-radioactive element has one or more infinitely stable isotope. Lead-208 is the most common isotope of lead in the universe, and does not decay.  Lead-206 and -207 are also both stable.  The "Island of stability" specifically refers to relatively stable transuranic elements because stable pre-uranic elements are, well, all around us.  -- Plutor 19:40, 28 July 2005 (UTC)

Thank you for your answer. I doubt every non-radioactive element has one or more infinitely (!) stable isotope, because most isotopes' half-lives are only very long, like many thousands or millions of years, but they do have half-lives, though imperceptible and thus practically insignificant. Lead-208, as I read, was an exception among them, because it doesn't only have a half-life of millions of years but some half-life of billions of years, I don't remember exactly, but several orders of magnitude larger. This striking difference is why I analogously said it might be part of an island of stability (in a broader sense), because its life is similarly much, much longer than those of the elements around it in the periodic table. Unusually stable shell-structure (as compared to the neighbouring elements) may be a feature of other elements as well. I think I will have to find and look up my specific source in Hungarian (whose title I can't recall at the moment :-. Adam78 02:06, 29 July 2005 (UTC)


 * I am not a chemist, but I don't think that any non-radioactive element has a half-life. Not because it's just extremely long (Uranium-238 has a half-life of 4.4 billion years), but because they don't decay.  If I remember correctly, the decay of sub-atomic particles like protons has been theorized, but never witnessed.  And it's likely on the scale of 1040 years or something ridiculous like that.  If you want to call pre-uranic elements an "Island of stability", feel free.  But no one else uses it that way.  -- Plutor 11:06, 29 July 2005 (UTC)


 * I personally believe all elements decay (along with subatomic particles). Some are just, as you said, on the order of something like 1040 or more years half-lifes, so they might as well be considered stable, but really aren't. In fact, chances are somewhere in the universe one of these atoms are decaying (especially if you consider quantum effects or effects of electromagnetic radiation -- is decay every truly spontaneous?). We just don't have a geiger counter large enough :-) Keep in mind that half-life isn't the decay time for individual atoms but for half of them (again, it's quantum probability, chemists). Most of them are more likely to be ripped apart by the expansion of the universe beforehand, but they still would eventually decay. netdragon 27 July 2006 (UTC)

Non-radioactive isotopes are considered to have 'infinite' half-lives: this may not be strictly true (ie. they may have half-lives in the eg. billions of trillions of years or greater range) but no decay has been detected so far. For the record, uranium-238 does has a half-life of around 4.5 billion years, so even though you are not a chemist Plutor, you are on the ball! (the approximate age of the Earth), and yet it is easy to detect its radioactivity!!--Osmium 14:24, 21 August 2005 (UTC)

Picture Request
I might be able to make a make-do sort of picture. Did you want anything specific? Veritas Liberum 23:41, 8 December 2005 (GMT)

Is this new image sufficient? If anyone can suggest any amendments, please feel free to do so. --Xanthine 13:08, 22 September 2006 (UTC)


 * I love it. It perfectly conveys the concept and is easy to understand. Bravo! --20:21, 23 September 2006 (UTC)


 * The picture is very nice. I would also like to see a complete picture which would include all the leightweight elements. --MarSch 12:34, 28 December 2006 (UTC)


 * How come the first two pictures in the article have completely opposite colour schemes? i.e. in one of the pictures, dark red is most stable and blue is least stable; in the other, dark red is the least stable and blue is the most stable. This can be quite confusing. If it is not too much trouble, this should be fixed so both pictures use the same scheme. Mimigu (talk) 05:48, 19 April 2009 (UTC)

Please Confirm Table
I added in the table based on other Wikipedia pages. I interpreted isotopes with half lifes that didn't have the pound symbol on the isotopes pages (linked to in the table) as "Observed isotopes" (ones that have been fabricated). Please correct if this information is inaccurate. - netdragon 27 July 2006 (UTC)

Why an Island
Anyone have theoretical background or references on why an island of stability should be expected? - David Gerard 16:24, May 22, 2004 (UTC)


 * It's based on observations and the neutron/proton ratio. netdragon 27 July 2006 (UTC)

Half-life numbers
Are exact numbers for the half-lives of these proposed isotopes available? When I read that existing isotopes of ununquadium were more stable than nearby elements, I really wanted to see some exact figures. --Dantheox 07:10, 19 January 2006 (UTC)
 * I added the table. Keep in mind that half-lifes for elements and decay times for individual atoms don't match. netdragon 27 July 2006 (UTC)
 * I'm deleting the unsourced predicted half lives. If these isotopes have not been observed and no complete half-life calculations can be sourced, they should be left out. Polonium 20:26, 4 October 2006 (UTC)
 * Actually, I deleted them as nonsense. If they are correct, then element 114 has a shorter half life than element 115, despite the fact that ununquadium is predicted to be at the center of the island of stability and the fact that odd isotopes (in protons and/or neutrons) are less stable that even isotopes. Polonium 20:31, 4 October 2006 (UTC)


 * A moment of investigation would have revealed their sources: If you go to the respective "Isotopes of..." articles -- which is linked to in table --- you will see a list of the isotopes and their properties, with a list of sources (references) at the bottom. Particularly (quoting):


 * Half-life, spin, and isomer data selected from these sources. Editing notes on this article's talk page.
 * Audi, Bersillon, Blachot, Wapstra. The Nubase2003 evaluation of nuclear and decay properties, Nuc. Phys. A 729, pp. 3-128 (2003).
 * National Nuclear Data Center, Brookhaven National Laboratory. Information extracted from the NuDat 2.1 database (retrieved Sept. 2005).
 * David R. Lide (ed.), Norman E. Holden in CRC Handbook of Chemistry and Physics, 85th Edition, online version. CRC Press. Boca Raton, Florida (2005). Section 11, Table of the Isotopes.


 * In the future please do your due diligence before removing information from the article. Kevin Baastalk 14:14, 12 June 2009 (UTC)

Who named "Rolandium" for Unbinilium?
Element 120 has not be made, so the IUPAC usually not named it, who "named" it "Rolandium"! Oscarcwk 04:14, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

It hasn't been.--Syd Henderson 05:51, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

"Nature" link
That article on Nature's website would be awesome and terribly relevant - if it didn't link to a page asking for 'Premimum Membership' in order to view the article? I sumbit that this is pretty useless for the majority of wiki usersd̪. --124.183.51.219 06:41, 30 September 2006 (UTC)


 * Also, the second reference link (the arvixblog article) doesn't work, and should either have a redirect to the article in an archive or removed. --K of slinky (talk) 14:03, 1 March 2010 (UTC)

Known and not observed?
I am a casual visitor. I don't know how to delete the column "number of known isotopes". What does mean that an isotope has never been observed, but is "known"? What does it tell us about an island of stability? 84.10.114.122 10:05, 9 December 2006 (UTC).

doubt statement on neutron stars
The electron atmosphere sounds dubious. need a reference

Neutron stars?

Astrophysicists often describe a neutron star as a gigantic atomic nucleus, since it has the same composition and approximate density, although it is held together by gravity rather than by atomic forces. However, since neutron stars are believed to have an "atmosphere" of electrons, it may be hypothetically proper to think of the neutron star as a complete atom with an enormously large atomic number. However, the properties are quite different, due to the much larger scale. For example, the nucleus of an atom is miniscule compared to the surrounding electron cloud, since quantum mechanics prevents the cloud from collapsing further. Electrons near a neutron star are much closer, and strongly affected by the neutron star's immense magnetic field.

Roadrunner 22:24, 28 December 2006 (UTC)

Please Add Hassium
Someone should add this information. Hassium-270, an isotope of hassium containing 108 protons and 162 neutrons, has a half-life of 30 seconds. Here is a link to the article: http://pubs.acs.org/cen/news/84/i52/8452hassium.html --164.156.227.2 17:42, 28 December 2006 (UTC)