The discovery of radioactivity allowed scientists to develop new methods of determining Earth's age, with astonishing results. Our planet is far older than people had thought! Students can understand ...

Radioactive decay is a spontaneous and random process. A block of radioactive material will contain many trillions of nuclei and not all nuclei are likely to decay at the same time so it is impossible ...

FOR ALL its eureka moments, science has taught us many unpalatable lessons about what we are powerless to do. We can’t dim the sun to remedy droughts or global warming. We can’t stave off the ravages ...

Physicists in France have measured the longest ever radioactive half-life - over twenty billion billion years - in a naturally occurring element that decays by emitting alpha-particles. Nőel Coron and ...

Introduction One way of creating energy is with nuclear reactors. These plants are generally safe, but occasionally there are accidents in which dangerous radioactive material escapes. You might have ...

The radiation emitted from unstable nuclei is called ionising radiation because as it passes through matter it can dislodge outer electrons from atoms causing them to become ions. An unstable nucleus ...