Title: spontaneous fission
Long Title: IUPAC Gold Book - spontaneous fission
DOI: 10.1351/goldbook.S05887
Status: current

Definition
Nuclear fission which occurs without the addition of particles or energy to the nucleus

Related Terms
- Nuclear fission: https://goldbook.iupac.org//terms/view/N04229
- nucleus: https://goldbook.iupac.org//terms/view/N04256
- particles: https://goldbook.iupac.org//terms/view/N04237

Source
- PAC, 1982, 54, 1533. 'Glossary of terms used in nuclear analytical chemistry (Provisional)' on page 1542 (https://doi.org/10.1351/pac198254081533)

Other Outputs
- html: https://goldbook.iupac.org/terms/view/S05887/html
- json: https://goldbook.iupac.org/terms/view/S05887/json
- xml: https://goldbook.iupac.org/terms/view/S05887/xml

Citation: Citation: 'spontaneous fission' in IUPAC Compendium of Chemical Terminology, 5th ed. International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry; 2025. Online version 5.0.0, 2025. 10.1351/goldbook.S05887
License: The IUPAC Gold Book is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike CC BY-SA 4.0 International (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/) for individual terms.
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Disclaimer: The International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry (IUPAC) is continuously reviewing and, where needed, updating terms in the Compendium of Chemical Terminology (the IUPAC Gold Book). Users of these terms are encouraged to include the version of a term with its use and to check regularly for updates to term definitions that you are using.
Accessed: 2026-05-30T09:53:56+00:00