RADIOACTIVITY

DISCOVERY OF RADIOACTIVITY
• Henri Becquerel Discovered radioactivity in 1896.

• He Accidentally discovered spontaneous

Radioactivity when he opened a drawer on a
overcast day.

• Though it was Henri Becquerel that discovered

radioactivity, it was Marie Curie who coined the
term.
DISCOVERY OFRADIOACTIVITY
• 1898 – Ernest Rutherford began studying the nature of
rays that were emitted .

• He then classified into three types according to their

penetrating power .

• Alpha Decay(α)
• Beta Decay(β)
• Gamma Decay(γ)
 Types of Radiation
• Alpha Rays (or alpha particles)= nuclei of Helium
atoms (2 Protons ,2 Neutrons )

• Beta Rays = Electrons

• Gamma Rays = High energy photons (packets of

energy)
 Alpha Decay
• Positively Charged, Can hardly penetrate piece of
Paper
• The loss of 2 neutrons and 2 protons (the Helium
nucleus) changes the atom .
•
223 219
𝑅𝑎 → 𝑅𝑛 + 24𝑎
88 86

• A Radium – 226 atom decays into a Radon -222

atom and a Helium Nucleus.
 Alpha Decay
.
 Alpha Decay
• Occurs because the strong nuclear force is unable
to hold very large nuclei together.

• The electrical repulsion between the protons of the

nucleus pushes apart and can act over much
larger distance then the strong nuclear force.

• An example of alpha decay is a smoke detector.

 Beta Decay
• Beta decay occurs with the emission of an electron
(e-) or β particle .

234 234
• T h→ P a + 1 0 e- + energy
90 91

• No nucleons are lost , and the total energy of the

nucleons are the same in daughter nucleus as in
the parent nucleus .
Beta Decay
 Beta Decay
• The electron emitted in beta decay is NOT an
orbital electron ; the electron is created in nucleus
itself .

• One of the neutrons changes to a proton and in the

process (to conserve charge ) throws off an
electron .

• These particles are referred to as “ beta particles “

so as not to confuse them with orbital electrons.
 Gamma Decay
• Gamma rays are photons having very high
energies.

• The decay of a nucleus by the emission of a

Gamma ray is much like the emission of photons by
excited electron .

• The Gamma rays come from an excited nucleus

that is trying to get back to its ground state .
Gamma Rays
 Half Life and Rate of
Decay
• Radioactivity is a random event ,we do not know
which atom will decay at what time but can use
probability to tell us how many of atoms will decay
in certain time period.

• The equation is :
ΔN= - λNΔt
Where ΔN is rate of decay and λ is Radioactivity
constant .
 Radioactivity Decay Law
• The previous equation can be rearranged to find
the number of atoms left after a specified amount
of time to decay .
• N= N˳ 𝑒 −λ𝑡
• The number of decays per second is called the
activity of sample.
• To signify how fast an isotope decays the term half
life is used.
 Half Life
• The half life of known radioactive isotopes vary from
about 10-22 seconds to 1028 seconds .

• The half life and decay constant have inverse

relationship to one another .The relationship is:
 Sample Problem
• The decay constant of a given nucleus is 5.4*10-3
/second. What is its half life? How much remains of
an initial 100-g sample after 6 hours?
THANK YOU