Mass excess

The mass excess of a nuclide is the difference between its actual mass and its mass number in daltons. It is one of the predominant methods for tabulating nuclear mass. The mass of an atomic nucleus is well approximated (less than 0.1% difference for most nuclides) by its mass number, which indicates that most of the mass of a nucleus arises from mass of its constituent protons and neutrons. Thus, the mass excess is an expression of the nuclear binding energy, relative to the binding energy per nucleon of carbon-12 (which defines the dalton). If the mass excess is negative, the nucleus has more binding energy than ¹²C, and vice versa. If a nucleus has a large excess of mass compared to a nearby nuclear species, it can radioactively decay, releasing energy.