Isotopes of tungsten

Naturally occurring Tungsten (W) consists of five isotopes whose half-lives are so long that they can be considered stable. All can decay into isotopes of element 72 (hafnium) by alpha emission; ¹⁸⁰W has been observed to have a half life of 1.8 +- 0.2 Ea. The other naturally occurring isotopes have not been observed to decay, constraining their half-lives to be: ¹⁸²W, T_1/2 > 8.3 Ea; ¹⁸⁴W, T_1/2 > 29 Ea; ¹⁸⁵W, T_1/2 > 13 Ea; ¹⁸⁶W, T_1/2 > 27 Ea. ^[1] On average, two alpha decays of ¹⁸⁰W occur in one gram of natural tungsten per year.

Additional recommended knowledge

What is the Correct Way to Check Repeatability in Balances?

How to ensure accurate weighing results every day?

Essential Laboratory Skills Guide

27 artificial radioisotopes of tungsten have been characterized, the most stable of which are ¹⁸¹W with a half-life of 121.2 days, ¹⁸⁵W with a half-life of 75.1 days, ¹⁸⁸W with a half-life of 69.4 days and ¹⁷⁸W with a half-life of 21.6 days. All of the remaining radioactive isotopes have half-lives of less than 24 hours, and most of these have half-lives that are less than 8 minutes. Tungsten also has 4 meta states, the most stable being ^179mW (t_½ 6.4 minutes).

Standard atomic mass: 183.84(1) u

Table

Notes

• Values marked # are not purely derived from experimental data, but at least partly from systematic trends. Spins with weak assignment arguments are enclosed in parentheses.
• Uncertainties are given in concise form in parentheses after the corresponding last digits. Uncertainty values denote one standard deviation, except isotopic composition and standard atomic mass from IUPAC which use expanded uncertainties.

References

• Isotope masses from Ame2003 Atomic Mass Evaluation by G. Audi, A.H. Wapstra, C. Thibault, J. Blachot and O. Bersillon in Nuclear Physics A729 (2003).
• Isotopic compositions and standard atomic masses from Atomic weights of the elements. Review 2000 (IUPAC Technical Report). Pure Appl. Chem. Vol. 75, No. 6, pp. 683-800, (2003) and Atomic Weights Revised (2005).
• 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.