I remember watching a video by a scientist youtuber (I think) saying that iron was the most stable element and there was a theory or something like that that said if/when the universe degrades the only thing remaining will be iron. I don’t remember when was this who made the video or who they were referencing but if this is an actual theory I’d like to know more about
In: Physics
all elements (besides iron) release energy when split into smaller atoms (like uranium in a nuclear reactor) or when fused together with other atoms (like hydrogen in the sun).
and in both cases the path to releasing energy leads towards iron.
iron is *always* energy negative with fusion or fission, it sits at the very bottom of that “energy valley” so it doesnt want to do anything, and everything that tries to do something with iron needs energy to do so from somewhere else
stuff generally always wants to release energy if possible, so nuclear reactions tend towards moving closer to being iron in the end.
so at the very end, when theres every bit of nuclear energy released, theres only iron left.
I believe the video you are referencing is “the crazy future if protons don’t decay” made by Sciencephile the AI, on youtube.
At least that’s the one I watched sometime ago
It is tecnicaly Nickel-62 not iron that hacve the highet nucalr binding energy per nucleon of 8.7946 MeV. It is followed by Iron-58 at 8.7922MeV and Iron-56 at 8.7903MeV
It is all about Nuclear Binding Energy, the energy required to remove a nuclaron, a protons or a neutond, for the core of a atom. If a nucalr reacon create a element with higher nuclear binding energy then energy is released. A graph of it look like [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_binding_energy#/media/File:Binding_energy_curve_-_common_isotopes.svg](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_binding_energy#/media/File:Binding_energy_curve_-_common_isotopes.svg) You can see if you mege to light element the binding energy increase. The same for if you split heavy element. Nickel-62 that have the highest biding energy so it can be split or merged to release energy.
The reasons it is usaly stated as Iron-56 That is because it have the lowest mass per nucleon not lowest binding energy. Protons have slightly heavier then neutons and Iron-56 have a higher percentage of protons then Iron-58 or Nickel-62. Iron-56 is also produce a lot more in nuclear reaction in stars.
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