Transmutation

Section 13.7 turns from natural (spontaneous) nuclear changes -- alpha decay, beta decay -- to non-spontaneous, human-induced nuclear reactions, generally called nuclear transmutations.

Nuclear transmutation is the transformation of one stable nucleus into a different nucleus, whether that resulting nucleus is itself stable or unstable. Where the resulting product nucleus IS radioactive, the specific transmutation is given its own name: artificial (or induced) radioactivity (covered in section 13.7.2).

A nuclear reaction is fundamentally different in character from an ordinary chemical reaction, and the two are usefully contrasted point by point. A chemical reaction rearranges atoms via the breaking and forming of chemical bonds and only ever involves the outer-shell (valence) electrons, is accompanied by comparatively small energy changes, and its rate is sensitive to temperature, pressure, concentration and catalysts. A nuclear reaction, by contrast, actually converts one isotope or element into an entirely different one, can directly involve protons, neutrons and other elementary particles (not just electrons), releases vastly larger amounts of energy (the fission of just 1 g of uranium-235 releases about $8.2\times10^7$ kJ, compared with only …