Evaluation procedures

Two main sources of data are used to obtain the recommended half-lives and emission probabilities: (1) Specific data evaluated from all available original publications (e.g. half-life); (2) Data already evaluated by specialists and compiled (e.g. Q values); if a new experimental study exists, the resulting measurements may be taken into account and the corresponding reference is included in the list of references for the relevant radionuclide. Not all intermediate stages in the compilation and evaluation of a decay parameter are presented in detail, in order to avoid unnecessary complexity. These stages comprise the following: (a) Critical analysis of published results and, if necessary, correction of these results to account for more recent values hitherto unavailable to the original experimentalists; as a rule, results without associated uncertainties are discarded and the rejection of values is documented; (b) Data obtained through private communications are only used when all of the necessary information has been provided directly by the scientist carrying out the measurements; (c) Adjustments may be made to the reported uncertainties; (d) Recommended values are derived from an analysis of all available measurements (or theoretical considerations), along with the combined standard uncertainty for a coverage factor of 1 corresponding to the 1 σ confidence level