Artist's rendition of the emission of one proton from various oxygen isotopes. Protons are in red while neutrons are in blue. These processes could be interpreted as the decay nucleus \( c \) into two other nuclei \( a \) and \( b \) $$ ^{N_c+Z_c}c \rightarrow ^{N_a+Z_a}a+ ^{N_b+Z_b}b . $$