system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
Are any radioactive elements or isotopes no longer radioactive when part of a molecule?
gpt
I think we can safely say that the answer here is no. The reason is that nuclear reactions and chemical bonds exist on vastly different energy scales. For example, a typical chemical bond is in the range of a few electronvolts (eV). On the other hand, when a nucleus decays, that can release several MeV of energy. The M there stands for mega, which means that you have a million times more energy! As a result, it is almost impossible for a chemical bond to somehow provide enough stabilization to prevent a nucleus from being radioactive. In fact, to a very good approximation the rate of nuclear decay can usually taken to be independent of the chemical environment.