HALF-LIFE

Length

of time during which

half of a given number of
atoms of a radioactive
nuclide decays.
An isotope with long half-life
is stable. An isotope with
very short half-life is very
radioactive.

Half-lives of Several Radioisotopes

Isotope:

Half-life:

Use:

5 years

14 days

Chemothe

detect
tumors

rapy

5730
years

4.5 billion
8 days
years

Archeolo

Hyperthyroi

gical dating

dism

geological
dating

NOTE: has a half-life of 4.5 billion

years. Very old rock samples can be
dated based on their
content.

The

oldest rock found on earth (in

Greenland) was dated 3.7 billion
years. The solar system has an
estimated age of 4.6 billion years
based on dating meteorites

Ex. The half-life of radiogold is approximately

three days. Radiogold is given to a patient
undergoing cancer therapy. Suppose a patient
is given an initial shot of 1.5 g of radiogold,
how much of it remains after nine days?
Time (days)
0
3
6
9

Amount (grams)
1.5
0.75
0.375
0.1875

Thus, only 0.1875 g remains after 9 days.

Barium-122 has a half-life of 2 minutes. A fresh

sample weighing 80 g was obtained. If it takes 10
minutes to set up an experiment using barium122, how much barium-122 will be left when the
experiment begins?
Every half-life, 2 minutes, half of the original
amount will undergo nuclear decay:
10
Time: start 2 min 4 min 6 min 8 min
min
Mass:

80 g

40 g

20 g

10 g

5g

2.5 g

At the end of 10 minutes (5 half-lives) only2.5 gare left,

the rest has decayed.

Exercise

If 10 mg of iodine 131 is given to a patient,

how much is left after 24 days? The half-life
of iodine-131 is 8 days.

Iodine-131 is used to destroy thyroid tissue

in the treatment of an overactive thyroid.
The half-life of iodine-131 is 8 days. If a
hospital receives a shipment of 200 g of
iodine-131, how much I-131 would remain
after 32 days?

 1.

The half life of a certain isotope is

1 day. At the end of two days, how
much of the isotope remains?
2. A sample of certain radioactive
material has a half-life of 1 year. How
much of this radioactive material will
be left at the end of three years?

Rates of radioactivity are remarkably

constant and are not affected by any
external conditions such as changes in
pressure and temperature.