Radioactivity

User Generated

Naan1

Science

Description

What is radio carbon and how is it produced???

User generated content is uploaded by users for the purposes of learning and should be used following Studypool's honor code & terms of service.

Explanation & Answer

Radiocarbon is a naturally occurring radioactive isotope of carbon. Atoms of radiocarbon behave in the same way as any other carbon atoms except that they weigh slightly more and, after an average of some 5000 years decay to nitrogen.

Because radiocarbon is a radioactive isotope, it only exists on the earth because it has been formed recently. We know from nuclear physics that several possible reactions can result in radiocarbon. These all involve neutrons.

The details are not important in understanding radiocarbon but the possible reactions are:

ReactionQ-valueCross sectionNeutron energy
14N(n,p)14C1.81+/-0.05 bthermal
16O(n,3He)14C-14.6MeV20+/-2 mb40-160MeV
16O(n,pd)14C-20.1MeV
16O(n,n2p)14C-22.3MeV


Anonymous
Really helpful material, saved me a great deal of time.

Studypool
4.7
Trustpilot
4.5
Sitejabber
4.4

Related Tags