Talk:Isotopes of calcium

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According to Wolfram Alpha, which uses much the same sources as this article, Calcium 40 has a half-life of 3E21 years. Which is wrong -- Wolfram Alpha or the article?William Jockusch (talk) 20:45, 22 October 2010 (UTC) The second paragraph states "50% of naturally occurring calcium is in the form of 40Ca" but the table clearly indicates that 40Ca has a natural abundance of ~97%. Is this just an error in the paragraph, or is it meant to indicate that 50% of the 40Ca comes from the 40K decay the paragraph discusses? Churten (talk) 19:00, 3 December 2010 (UTC)

The term "stable isotope" is sometimes used in an observational sense, and sometimes in a stricter theoretical sense. An observationally stable isotope is one whose decay has never been observed, whereas a theoretically stable isotope is one which cannot decay in principle because the original nucleus has less mass-energy than any combination of potential decay products. By this strict criterion, the observationally stable calcium isotopes 40Ca and 46Ca are theoretically unstable, and should in principle decay with very long half lives. Theoretically unstable isotopes can be come observationally unstable when their decay is detected experimentally. This happened for example with the common isotope of bismuth, 209Bi. The situation is well explained in the Wikipedia article Stable isotope and references cited therein. The status of the calcium isotopes is listed in the table in that article "List of observationally-stable isotopes". Also, though theoretically unstable, 40Ca is the commonest isotope, accounting for 97% of terrestrial calcium, according to the authoritative Brookhaven NNDC chart of nuclides. I have revised the article to reflect this.CharlesHBennett (talk) 20:51, 8 June 2011 (UTC)
 * I've revised it back to just "Stable". None of the other isotope tables distinguish theoretically stable from observationally stable, so, unless you want to change all the theoretically unstable isotopes to "observationally stable", this should be left as is XinaNicole (talk) 08:09, 5 July 2011 (UTC)

Calcium has the EE20Ca40 isotope which is the heaviest stable A= 2 X Z Isotope that is known to exist. It also has the ability to accumulate up to 2, 3, 4, 6, and 8 extra neutrons, with 97% of the population being of the A = 40 category + 2% being of the A = 44 category (with 4 extra neutrons). But this is the last element with an A=2Z stable isotope, with the rest of the EE elements in this series having stable isotopes in the A=2Z + 4 category. The element 28Ni Nickel is noted to have 26% of its atoms of the A=2Z + 4 category, but the interesting thing about 28Ni Nickel is that it has a 68% constituency of the isotope EE28Ni58 with only 2 extra neutrons, which results in its composite element atomic mass value being 58.6934, and less than the 58.9332 mass value of its single stable isotope namely OO59Co Cobalt, which is stable with 28Deuterons + 5 extra neutrons. So at this point in the element series not very many extra neutrons are required for the existence of stable EE isotopes are required for atomic stability.WFPM (talk) 02:02, 28 August 2011 (UTC) And an important question is how a 20Ca Calcium atom was able to acquire so many extra neutrons.WFPM (talk) 00:16, 31 January 2012 (UTC)
 * coincidence -- first non-valence (3d) electrons, first neutron-heavy nuclei ?? Calcium-40 is the most massive nucleus to remain stable with equal numbers of protons & neutrons. All heavier nuclei "prefer" excess neutrons.  And, all heavier nuclei-cum-atoms "stick" electrons into interior, non-valence (d,f) orbitals.  Is that coincidence, between the physics occurring within the nucleus, and between the same and surrounding electrons, significant ? 66.235.38.214 (talk) 05:28, 17 October 2012 (UTC)

If the atomic nucleus is considered as an accumulation of deuterons (plus extra neutrons), then the atom of EE20Ca40 may be considered as being an accumulation of 20 deuterons. Then, based upon the indication of the periodic table, the atom may be further considered to be the accumulation of 4 alpha particles plus 12 additional deuterons. And if the alpha particles are considered to have a planar structure, we can then visualize the atom as being a stack of 4 alpha particles surrounded by 2 6 unit wraps of deuterons, and that the extra neutrons fit into the structure usually 2 at a time to create the heavier 20Ca isotopes.WFPM (talk) 16:23, 15 June 2012 (UTC)

Ca-46
Is Ca-46 stable? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 59.126.202.81 (talk) 13:26, 13 August 2012 (UTC)
 * Yes, observationally. Theoretically it can decay by double beta decay to Ti-46, but this has never been observed. Double sharp (talk) 03:13, 2 November 2012 (UTC).Cristiano Toàn (talk) 04:49, 10 February 2024 (UTC) the predicted double beta decay energy of Calcium-46 is only 0.988 Mev, by comparison the double beta decay energy of Calcium-48 is about 4.274 Mev with half-life 5.6×10^19 years


 * The possibility of the Beta minus decay can occur to atoms which have rather loosely bound extra neutrons, since it is then a fairly low energy differential process for them to become a proton and then combine with with another extra neutron to become an integrated deuteron particle. However such a process should be such as to cause the resultant deuteron to be better integrated into the nucleus and thus have a lower retained free energy value. It would also have to be a part of the dynamics of the rotational angular momentum balancing process existing in the nucleus related to its level of rotation. The decay mode is not supposed to be temperature sensitive and therefore not sensitive to the translational velocity of the atoms. The occurrence of high numbers of extra neutrons in an atom is noted to occur in the case of the EE atoms which are better suited by number to the creation of a balanced nuclear structure.WFPM (talk) 03:43, 3 December 2012 (UTC)


 * Below the existence of the isotope EE29Ca40, with 96.941% constituency, the isotope EE20Ca48 is noted in Nubase to decrease to be the lowest mass defect value (-44,214 Kev) of the isotopes of 20Ca Calcium. However it is weakly B- radioactive and eventually decays to EE22Ti48. Also,EO20Ca47 And EO20Ca45 are both more radioactive and decay to EOTi47 and EOTi45 respectively. However the extra neutron of EE20Ca46 is sufficiently bound to its position in the nucleus (at -43135 Kev) such that it doesn't decay to OE21Sc46 (at -41757 Kev). This data would imply that these isotopes had achieved these extra neutron accumulation conditions during some nuclear accumulation process after which they were permitted to a later time period of decay. It also implies the continued existence of  the capability of maintaining the physical construction properties of the nucleus over a considerable time period.WFPM (talk) 21:51, 8 December 2012 (UTC)WFPM (talk) 21:30, 24 July 2013 (UTC)

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