text: Tc, half-life 211k years, is produced at a yield of about 6% per fission; see also the main fission products page. It is also produced (via the short lived nuclear isomer Technetium-99m) as a decay product of Molybdenum-99. Technetium is particularly mobile in the environment as it forms negatively charged pertechnetate-ions and it presents the biggest radiological hazard among the long lived fission products. Despite being a metal, Technetium usually doesn't form positively charged ions, but Technetium halides like Technetium hexafluoride exist. TcF is a nuisance in uranium enrichment as its boiling point () is very close to that of uranium hexafluoride (). The issue is known to enrichment facilities because spontaneous fission also yields small amounts of Technetium (which will be in secular equilibrium with its parent nuclides in natural uranium) but if fluoride volatility is employed for reprocessing, a significant share of the "uranium" fraction of fractional distillation will be contaminated with Technetium requiring a further separation step.
  Technetium-99 is suitable for nuclear transmutation by slow neutrons as it has a sufficient thermal neutron cross section and as it has no known stable isotopes. Under neutron irradiation, Tc-99 forms Tc-100 which quickly decays to stable  a valuable platinum group metal.