A general decay form and absolute nuclear stability

RESUMO

A nucleus is conventionally called stable when no decay has been observed. We replace this phenomenological definition with a criterion based on conservation laws alone. For this purpose, we formulate a general decay form (GDF) for finite charge-neutral nuclear systems that includes all possible final configurations allowed by known conservation laws. A nucleus is absolutely stable if no allowed configuration has lower mass. A global search over all nuclei with measured atomic masses yields 84 absolutely stable nuclei. Beyond the criterion of absolute stability, we introduce a dimensionless decay-accessibility entropy SGDF to quantify the relative accessibility of GDF-allowed decay channels. We rank all naturally occurring isotopes according to their maximum SGDF values and predict their dominant decay modes and corresponding partial half-lives. We further identify promising candidates for natural alpha and two-neutrino double-beta decays. The resulting framework also provides a nuclear-scale perspective on the far-future evolution of matter, in which nuclear decay drives matter toward combinations of these 84 absolutely stable nuclei before still slower forms of matter evolution. These findings extend the conventional phenomenological stable-radioactive classification to a conservation-law-based framework for nuclear stability and provide a quantitative roadmap for future rare-decay searches.