zinc66

Zinc-66, often abbreviated Zn-66, is a stable isotope of zinc, an element with atomic number 30. It has mass number 66, corresponding to 30 protons and 36 neutrons in the nucleus.

Zn-66 occurs naturally in zinc metal and its alloys. It is one of the five stable isotopes of zinc and makes up about 27% of natural zinc, though the exact fraction can vary slightly by source and sample.

Because Zn-66 is stable, it does not decay and has a practically infinite half-life. Like other zinc isotopes, its chemical properties are identical to those of zinc; isotopic mass does not influence chemical reactivity or bonding behavior.

Applications of Zn-66 are mainly scientific. It is used as an isotope tracer in biochemical and environmental studies to investigate zinc metabolism and transport in biological systems. It also serves as a mass spectrometry standard and for calibration in isotope ratio measurements, where precise isotopic composition is important.

Production and enrichment: In most cases Zn-66 is present naturally in zinc. For applications requiring higher enrichment, isotopic separation methods such as gas centrifugation or electromagnetic separation can be employed to increase the proportion of Zn-66 in a sample.

See also: zinc isotopes, Zn-64, Zn-67, Zn-68, Zn-70.