Barium nitrate Barium nitrate Barium nitrate is the inorganic compound with the chemical formula Ba(NO). It, like most barium salts, is colorless, toxic, and water-soluble. It burns with a green flame and is an oxidizer; the compound is commonly used in pyrotechnics. Barium nitrate is manufactured by two processes that start with the main source material for barium, the carbonate. The first involves dissolving barium carbonate in nitric acid, allowing any iron impurities to precipitate, then filtered, evaporated, and crystallized. The second requires combining barium sulfide with nitric acid. It occurs naturally as the very rare mineral "nitrobarite". At elevated temperatures, barium
Isotopes of barium exceptions are Ba, which has a half-life of 10.51 years, Ba (11.5 days), and Ba (2.55 minutes), which is the decay product of Cs (30.17 years, and a common fission product). Barium-114 is predicted to undergo cluster decay, emitting a nucleus of stable C to produce Sn. However this decay is not yet observed; the upper limit on the branching ratio of such decay is 0.0034%. Isotopes of barium Naturally occurring barium (Ba) is a mix of six stable isotopes and one very long-lived radioactive primordial isotope, barium-130, recently identified as being unstable by geochemical means (from analysis of the