Hi
Radioactive decay -
A radioactive nuclide has a decay constant of - 10^-6 s-1 what is its half life ?
I have come up with
is IN (2) / 0.000001 s-1 = 693147.18055
which i am having troube working into real figures
Can anyone help please .. thanks
Of course! I can help you with that.
To find the half-life of a radioactive nuclide with a given decay constant, you can use the formula:
t(1/2) = ln(2) / λ
Where:
t(1/2) is the half-life
ln(2) is the natural logarithm of 2 (approximately 0.69314718055)
λ is the decay constant in units of s^-1.
In your case, the decay constant is given as -10^-6 s^-1.
Using the formula, we can calculate the half-life as follows:
t(1/2) = ln(2) / (-10^-6 s^-1)
t(1/2) = 0.69314718055 / (-10^-6)
t(1/2) = -0.69314718055 x 10^6 s
The negative sign indicates that the decay constant is in the direction of decreasing quantity. However, for the half-life, we generally prefer a positive value. Therefore, we can consider the absolute value of the half-life:
t(1/2) ≈ 0.69314718055 x 10^6 s
This approximation gives you the half-life of the radioactive nuclide in seconds. To convert it into other units (e.g., minutes, hours, or days), you can divide or multiply by conversion factors accordingly.