Easyphysics
GCSE - OCR 21 Century 
P3 Radioactive Materials
Index
Glossary

Did you know? 

Half-life of radioisotopes ranges from 61 seconds for ismuth-212 to 4.5 billion years for uranium-238.

 

     

 P3 Half-life

Syllabus Summary Questions Answers

       

         1.  Half-life is the time taken for half of the radioactive material to decay.

         2.  Different radioactive materials have the same half-life: false.

         Higher tier only:

         3.  The half-life of an isotope that had an activity of 1000 at the start of an experiment 

              and 500 twenty 20 minutes later is: 20 minutes.

         4.  Technetium-99m is widely used in medicine. Its half-life is 6 hours.

              If the mass of technetium-99m present in a sample is initially 120 g. 

              The mass left after 12 hours is 60 g.

         5.  Table for the decay of lead-210 isotope.

Number of half-lives New count per minute Fraction left
0 432 1
1 216 1/2
2 108 1/4
3 54 1/8
4 27 1/16