Nuclear and Radiochemistry

Radioactivity

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Radioactivity, otherwise called radioactive decay or nuclear decay, is the procedure by which a nucleus of an unsteady atom loses energy by emitting radiation. Material that suddenly emanates such radiation, which incorporates alpha particles, beta particles, gamma rays and transformation electrons, is viewed as radioactive.

Radioactive decay is an arbitrary process at the level of single atoms, in that, as indicated by quantum hypothesis, it is difficult to anticipate when a specific atom will decay. The chance that a given atom will decay never shows signs of change, that is, it doesn't make a difference to what extent the atom has existed. For a vast gathering of atoms however, the decay rate for that accumulation can be computed from their measured decay constants or half-lives. This is the premise of radiometric dating. The half-moiety of radioactive atoms have no known limits for shortness or length of term, and range more than 55 orders of magnitude in time.