Carbon-12 Carbon-12 Carbon-12 (C) is the more abundant of the two stable isotopes of carbon (Carbon-13 being the other), amounting to 98.93% of the element carbon; its abundance is due to the triple-alpha process by which it is created in stars. Carbon-12 is of particular importance in its use as the standard from which atomic masses of all nuclides are measured, thus, its atomic mass is exactly 12 daltons by definition. Its nucleus contains 6 protons and 6 neutrons. Before 1959 both the IUPAP and IUPAC used oxygen to define the mole; the chemists defining the mole as the number of
Isotopes of roentgenium Isotopes of roentgenium Roentgenium (Rg) is a synthetic element, and thus a standard atomic weight cannot be given. Like all synthetic elements, it has no stable isotopes. The first isotope to be synthesized was Rg in 1994, which is also the only directly synthesized isotope; all others are decay products of nihonium, moscovium, and tennessine, and possibly copernicium, flerovium, and livermorium. There are 7 known radioisotopes from Rg to Rg. The longest-lived isotope is Rg with a half-life of 2.1 minutes, although the unconfirmed Rg and Rg may have a longer half-life of about 5.1 minutes and 10.7 minutes respectively.