Radioactive decay half life calculator

The half-life calculator is a tool that helps you understand the principles of radioactive decay. You can use it to not only learn how to calculate half-life, but also as a way of finding the initial and final quantity of a substance or its decay constant, radioactive decay half life calculator.

The following tools can generate any one of the values from the other three in the half-life formula for a substance undergoing decay to decrease by half. Half-life is defined as the amount of time it takes a given quantity to decrease to half of its initial value. The term is most commonly used in relation to atoms undergoing radioactive decay, but can be used to describe other types of decay, whether exponential or not. One of the most well-known applications of half-life is carbon dating. The half-life of carbon is approximately 5, years, and it can be reliably used to measure dates up to around 50, years ago. The process of carbon dating was developed by William Libby, and is based on the fact that carbon is constantly being made in the atmosphere.

Radioactive decay half life calculator

Post a Question. Our half-life calculator gives accurate answers to the calculations involving various parameters pertaining radioactive decay. It also displays the formula used in the computation and steps followed in arriving at the answer. You need to follow key steps when using this calculator. Here you click drop down arrow and select the parameter or the quantity you want the calculator to compute. Radioactive materials are generally unstable and therefore undergo spontaneous disintegration radioactive decay to form a stable nuclide, radiations and energy. The amount in this case refers to mass or number of atoms of a radioactive sample. In terms of activity, half-life can be defined as the time it takes for the activity disintegration per second of an unstable nuclide to decrease by one-half as it undergoes radioactive decay. Radioactive decay yields stable nuclides, particles alpha, beta, gamma rays and energy. Change in the mass of nuclide, number of atoms as well as the time it takes for the decay to occur are useful in the calculation of half-life. Radioactive nuclides have different unique half-lives that are independent of concentration and environmental factors such as change in temperature and pressure. The half-lives of these radioactive isotopes range from fractions of a second to billions of years. For example, Nobelium has a half-life of 3 seconds while uranium has a very long half-life of 4.

How to calculate decay constant in the calculator.

Disclaimer: This calculator is offered freely as a helpful tool. All outputs should be independently verified, and the user is solely responsible for the use of the calculator and any results. Radformation disclaims any warranties and is not responsible for how this tool is utilized or the results it provides. Here, we present a radioactive decay calculator, which calculates the amount of radioactive activity a substance will have after decaying for a given time. The formula for radioactive decay is derived from the familiar exponential decay formula and is as follows:. Selecting an isotope from the drop-down will automatically populate the half-life field the provided half-life can be edited as desired.

Radiation is quite dangerous, and in order to understand it and its risks, scientists introduced many measurement units: our radioactive decay calculator will teach you how the activity of a substance is measured. Here you will learn:. Sometimes, important discoveries happen by chance: this was particularly true at the end of the XIX century when decades of experiments with electricity and photography finally led to the initial understanding of the phenomenon of radioactivity. He discovered that shielding that radiation was not stopping another kind of ray: X-rays. The origin of X-rays was not known at the time, and the French physicist Henri Becquerel was investigating the possibility of using solar-stimulated uranium salts to emit X-rays. He did this by trying to impress a photographic film after the salts were exposed to the sun and wrapping them in black paper. Those were truly the Age of Exploration in physics.

Radioactive decay half life calculator

Following the somewhat serendipitous discovery of radioactivity by Becquerel, many prominent scientists began to investigate this new, intriguing phenomenon. During the beginning of the twentieth century, many radioactive substances were discovered, the properties of radiation were investigated and quantified, and a solid understanding of radiation and nuclear decay was developed. The spontaneous change of an unstable nuclide into another is radioactive decay. The unstable nuclide is called the parent nuclide ; the nuclide that results from the decay is known as the daughter nuclide. The daughter nuclide may be stable, or it may decay itself. The radiation produced during radioactive decay is such that the daughter nuclide lies closer to the band of stability than the parent nuclide, so the location of a nuclide relative to the band of stability can serve as a guide to the kind of decay it will undergo Figure

Breville canada service à la clientèle

How to calculate mean-life in the calculator. Share calculator:. The formula for radioactive decay is derived from the familiar exponential decay formula and is as follows:. Our versatile radioactive decay calculator supports many different time units and automatically converts them if the time unit you measure the time elapsed is different than the time unit you enter the half-time, decay constant or mean lifetime in. The formula for calculating the time elapsed from the beginning of the decay process to the current moment, or a chosen moment in the future, relative to the beginning of the decay is calculated using the formula:. Each radioactive material contains stable and unstable nuclei. Half-live has been used to describe other decays which may or not be exponential. De Moivres Theorem Calculator. To find half-life: Find the substance's decay constant. The carbon undergoes radioactive decay once the plant or animal dies, and measuring the amount of carbon in a sample conveys information about when the plant or animal died. How to calculate mean-life in the calculator The calculator can give mean lifetime using equations 7, 9 and

Disclaimer: This calculator is offered freely as a helpful tool. All outputs should be independently verified, and the user is solely responsible for the use of the calculator and any results. Radformation disclaims any warranties and is not responsible for how this tool is utilized or the results it provides.

Time Elapsed. Convert half-life to mean lifetime or decay constant, and vice versa by entering any of the three values in its respective field. A material containing such unstable nuclei is considered radioactive. Related Content. Seaborg G. Radioactive Decay Calculator is a free online tool that displays the half life of the given isotope. The calculator can give mean lifetime using equations 7, 9 and We believe everyone should have free access to Physics educational material, by sharing you help us reach all Physics students and those interested in Physics across the globe. Share calculator:. Radioactive materials are generally unstable and therefore undergo spontaneous disintegration radioactive decay to form a stable nuclide, radiations and energy. The relation between half-life, mean lifetime and the decay constant can be expressed by the equation:.