Template:Actinides vs fission products/sandbox

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Actinides[1] by decay chain Half-life
range (a)
Fission products by yield[2]
4n 4n+1 4n+2 4n+3 4.5–7% 0.04–1.25% <0.001%
228Ra 4 – 6* 155Euþ
244Cm 241Puƒ 250Cf 227Ac 10 – 29 90Sr 85Kr 113mCdþ
232Uƒ 238Pu 243Cmƒ 29 – 97 137Cs 151Smþ 121mSn
241Am 249Cfƒ 242mAmƒ 251Cfƒ[3] 140 – 900

No fission products
have a half-life
in the range of
100 – 210k years…

226Ra 247Bk 1.3k – 1.6k
240Pu 229Th 246Cm 243Am 4.7k – 7.4k
245Cmƒ 250Cm 239Puƒ 8.3k – 24.1k
230Th 231Pa 32k – 76k
236Npƒ 233Uƒ 234U 150k – 250k ** 99Tc 126Sn
248Cm 242Pu 327k – 375k 79Se
237Np 1.5M – 6.5M 93Zr
? – ? 135Cs 107Pd
236U 247Cmƒ 15M – 24M 129I
244Pu 235Uƒ№ 80M – 704M

...nor beyond 15.7M[4]

232Th 238U 4.4G – 14G

Legend for superscript symbols used:
₡ has thermal neutron capture cross section in the range of 8 – 50 barns
ƒ for fissile
m is metastable isomer
№ for naturally occurring radioactive material (NORM)
þ is neutron poison (thermal neutron capture cross section greater than 3k barns)
*  range 4a – 100a: Medium-lived fission product
** range 150ka – 15Ma: Long-lived fission product

References

  1. ^ Plus radium (element 88). While actually a sub-actinide, it immediately precedes actinium (89) and follows a three element gap of instability after polonium (84) where no isotopes have half-lives of at least four years (the longest-lived isotope in the gap is radon-222 with a half life of less than four days). Radium's longest lived isotope, at a notable 1600 years, thus merits the element's inclusion here.
  2. ^ Specifically from thermal neutron fission of U-235, e.g. in a typical nuclear reactor.
  3. ^ This is the heaviest isotope with a half-life of at least four years before the "Sea of Instability".
  4. ^ Excluding those 'classically stable' isotopes with half-lives significantly in excess of 232Th, e.g. while 113mCd has a half-life of only fourteen years, that of 113Cd is nearly eight quadrillion.