^Binding energy per nucleon

^Binding energy per nucleon

1. is low for both heavy & light nuclei.

2. increases rapidly up to A = 20 & have peaks for ₂He⁴, ₆C¹² & ₈ O¹⁶ .

3. increases gradually after A = 20.

4. becomes less or more flat between A = 40 to 120.

Also it has average value in this region is 8.5 MeV.

5. has maximum value 8.8 MeV for the ₂₆Fe⁵⁶.

6. decrease after A =120 & drops to 7.6Mev for ₉₂U²³⁸.

In order to increases the values of binding energies light nuclei undergo fusion while heavy nuclei undergo fission reactions i.e. heavy nuclei become more stable after fission & light nuclei become more stable after fusion.