Naturally occurring titanium (22Ti) is composed of five stable isotopes; 46Ti, 47Ti, 48Ti, 49Ti and 50Ti with 48Ti being the most abundant (73.8% natural abundance). Twenty-one radioisotopes have been characterized, with the most stable being 44Ti with a half-life of 60 years, 45Ti with a half-life of 184.8 minutes, 51Ti with a half-life of 5.76 minutes, and 52Ti with a half-life of 1.7 minutes. All of the remaining radioactive isotopes have half-lives that are less than 33 seconds, and the majority of these have half-lives that are less than half a second. The isotopes of titanium range in atomic mass from 39.00 u (39Ti) to 64.00 u (64Ti). The primary decay mode for isotopes lighter than the stable isotopes (lighter than 46Ti) is β+ and the primary mode for the heavier ones (heavier than 50Ti) is β−; their respective decay products are scandium isotopes and the primary products after are vanadium isotopes.

List of isotopes

Titanium-44

Titanium-44 (44Ti) is a radioactive isotope of titanium that undergoes electron capture to an excited state of scandium-44 with a half-life of 60 years, before the ground state of 44Sc and ultimately 44Ca are populated. Because titanium-44 can only undergo electron capture, its half-life increases with ionization and it becomes stable in its fully ionized state (that is, having a charge of +22). Titanium-44 is produced in relative abundance in the alpha process in stellar nucleosynthesis and the early stages of supernova explosions. It is produced when calcium-40 fuses with an alpha particle (helium-4 nucleus) in a star's high-temperature environment; the resulting 44Ti nucleus can then fuse with another alpha particle to form chromium-48. The age of supernovae may be determined through measurements of gamma-ray emissions from titanium-44 and its abundance. It was observed in the Cassiopeia A supernova remnant and SN 1987A at a relatively high concentration, a consequence of delayed decay resulting from ionizing conditions.