Beta decay Definition and 142 Threads

I don't understand clearly what I have to do with the presented info (numbers). I've only just started radiochemistry and nobody has explained to me how to draw decay schemes. If you have any suggestions, advice, or recommended literature (or even step-by-step instructions), it would be a God's...

TL;DR Summary: Currently working on a project for lab where we're sending Geiger counters 100k feet into the air. Goal is to determine radiation as a function of altitude. Need some guidance. Hi everyone, I'm currently working on a project for lab where we're sending Geiger counters 100k feet...

I was wondering whether the decay of neutrons and protons (if they happen to be able to decay, as it is predicted by some GUTs) could be avoided in some cases. Let's begin with neutrons: In principle neutrons have a very short time when they are isolated (around 10 minutes) and they suffer...

Different elements and isotopes have different rates of beta decay because the half-life of the element or isotope reflects its stability, which is determined by the nuclear force between the protons and neutrons in the nucleus of the atom. The number of protons and neutrons affects the balance...

I'm reviewing history of subatomic physics. By 1931AD the nuclear physics community had decided to propose the neutrino because they couldn't explain beta decay without it. Alpha and Gamma decays were more confined wrt the energy they would extract from the nucleus i.e. they had energy bands. By...

I was looking at the gamma radiation data from IAEA's website: (https://www-nds.iaea.org/relnsd/vcharthtml/VChartHTML.html) and was confused by the absolute intensity listed in the page. I Googled it and it seems to be the probability of emission but why it doesn't add up to 100%? For example...

Hello all. I'm an undergraduate student looking to conduct an experiment with an isotope that undergoes beta decay. I am curious as to the degree to which the isotope geometry will reduce the energy of/deflect beta particles emitted from the isotope. By geometry, I mean the "shape" of the...

Hello! Can someone point me towards a derivation (whether with Fermi Golden rule, or full QFT calculations) of the decay rate for the neutrinoless double beta decay: $$\Gamma_{\beta\beta}^{0\nu} = G^{0\nu}|M^{0\nu}|^2<m_{\beta\beta}>^2$$ Thank you!

During beta decay an electron and neutrino are emitted at very high speeds. I thought that the electron and neutrino were the product of w boson decay but I recently learned w bosons are over 80 GeV worth of energy. My question is, where does this mass come from? I know that atoms get enough...

Hi, Please note that I'm trying to understand it at very basic level. I'd really appreciate if you could help me with the queries below. I was reading this article, https://www.space.com/four-fundamental-forces.html, on the four fundamental forces of nature. Under the section The weak force...

Hello, When you have a beta decay you get the typical continuos spectrum representing counts against the kinetic energy of the electron. But what's the shape and how I get the spectrum of the kinetic energy of the neutrinos? Thanks

Some alpha or beta decays produce an excited daughter nucleus, which typically immediately emits one or more gama rays to reach a ground state. This is the case for beta decay of Co-60 or Na-24 for example. While the table of cobalt isotopes on Wikipedia mentions the gamma emission, the one for...

My idea was to consider first the structure of the matrix element and to see if there are any possible constraints that we could use for parametrization. If I am not mistaken, we are dealing with the hadronic decay governed by QCD which conserves parity. Since we have a derivative operator...

I am confused about the disintegration energies of beta minus and beta plus decay. Regarding beta minus decay, the textbook says that "the number of electron masses has been accounted for in Equation (12.38)." What does that mean? Usually the disintegration energy is simply the mass of the...

In addition to the usual alpha and beta particles visible in my condensation cloud chamber, I see occasional tracks that seem highly energetic -they easily penetrate the entire width of the cloud chamber (10-12 inches) going in one side and out the other. More mysteriously, their orientation is...

Can you compare the energy loss of electrons and protons due to the radiation they emit? In fact, I want to know which of the two loses more energy when it emits radiation.

I was looking at the decay scheme (https://www-nds.iaea.org/relnsd/vcharthtml/VChartHTML.html) of ##^{112}Ag## which ##\beta##-decays to ##^{112}Cd##. ##Cd## is most likely left in an excited states, so it decays to its ground state by ##\gamma##-emission. As you can see there are tons of...

Hi! This is a very very noob question, but I am starting to get into particle physics and I don't understand the application of crossing symmetry in the inverse beta decay. Crossing symmetry says (from Griffiths) that, in a reaction "any of these particles can be 'crossed' over to the other...

Hello all, I've got a question on nuclear decay "reversal" in beta emitters. I've been researching the Cowan-Reines experiment, which used neutrinos to convert protons into neutrons. Recently, I found out that the particle which hits the proton need not necessarily be a neutrino in order to...

Hi All We know that beta decay is and ejection of an electron from nucleus, making a proton turn into a neutron (and a neutrino). Is it correct to say that is the weak force responsible for the increasing in the distance between electron and proton during this process (since the feel atracked...

I was learning about beta decay, and how a down quark decays into an up quark by emitting a W- boson which then becomes an electron and an electron antineutrino. I have two main questions - Firstly, how can the down quark be considered a fundamental particle, when it can break down to produce...

##\beta^{+}## decay (a proton decays to a neutron + positron + electron neutrino) is a decay in which mass energy is not conserved. I've been taught that if that ought to be the case for a decay/reaction, it would be forbidden (please see solution manual below): But ##\beta^{+}## decay is...

I have plastic which contains large amounts of Co-60 and Cs-137. I have already calculated the integrated (50k years) deposited dose from the gamma radiation using Monte-Carlo methods (SCALE). I am now interested in the contribution to deposited dose from the Beta emissions. -I am assuming that...

When we say energy is applied to that field to create an excitation which is a particle, where does that energy come from and how is it applied? For example on beta decay where a new electron is formed, where does the energy come from the create an excitement in the electron field?

Problem Statement: In beta-decay, a gamma ray that is a fast moving electron is emitted due to the conversion of a neutron to a proton and an electron to increase the stability. As a result, the atomic number increases while the mass number remains the same. But when the atomic no. increases as...

Hi, I want to develop a Monte Carlo simulation to determine the temperature of a beta radioisotope (Sr-90) of a given mass for my master thesis in Computational Physics. I am rookie to simulations. How much time will take to develop such a code. Thnaks a lot

I recently read about a beta decay isotope (Rhenium-187),whose half life was changed from 42 X 109 years to 33 years, just by stripping the nucleus of all it's electrons. Why does this allow for a faster decay, and does this apply to all beta decay nuclei, or just Rhenium 187?

I recently started learning about quarks and leptons and was wondering what happens to the fermions (specifically the quarks and leptons) during a beta decay. How is the electron/positron created and what causes the up quarks and down quarks to change flavours? If this is a bad question please...

Homework Statement [/B] The problem states that 24 11Na is radioactive. The question asks if it's a β- or β+ emitter. The 24 is the atomic mass number and the 11 is the atomic number. Homework Equations I know that in β- decay, the atomic number increases by 1 and it emits an electron and...

Hey everyone, I've learned about double beta decay and neutrinoless double beta decay recently. So we have two "conditions" for decay, 2v decay and 0v decay. Now, to the question I have: There have been a lot of experiments measuring 2v decay rates, and there have been many experiments...

Hi, I have a question about calculating probabilities in situations where a particle experiences a sudden change in potential, in the case where both potentials are time independent. For example, a tritium atom undergoing spontaneous beta decay, and turning into a Helium-3 ion. The orbital...

Hi! I hace been trying to calculate how many energy in form of beta radiation is emitted in one if those "Tritiglows" sold in Amazon. I did the following math (imatge) and got a really high energy. How is that posible? Where did I failed...

QUESTION: I read in book that in beta + decay proton decays to neutron But i can't understand how it is possible if proton mass is less than neutron mass.I read on net but it says 'quarks' and 'd u p' things which i don't study about currently. Also why it only happen inside nucleus?What...

I know that Q value of a reaction is the difference between total initial mass-energy and total final mass-energy of all the products. Then shouldn't be this also the maximum kinetic energy and hence endpoint energy of an electron in beta decay. But what I have read endpoint energy ##E_0 = Q +...

I bought one of those small tritium veils with phosphorus. Read about beta decay, wow what an interesting read! So there was mention when a neutron decays into a proton it emits an electron and an electron anti-neutrino. Also that there is no spatial parity with the physics. What does no...

Hello Basically i need some help or references on proving that Working with spherical tensors in a 0_ ---> 0+ forbidden beta decay could you please give me some hints on how to do this proof? Thank you

Do Fermi and Gamow-Teller transitions only refer to changes in isospin , as in beta decay and orbital electron capture

Im try to understand this paper http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/vie... and see if I correctly understand which processes are charge-current processes, and which are charge neutral, as listed in Figure 1. Thanks

If you have a free neutron viewed from a known frame of reference which is known to be spin up and it decays, is there anything in theory or experiment which indicates whether the remaining proton will be spin up or down? Thanks Jerry

I think I got this right, I just want a second opinion to know if my concepts are correct 1. Homework Statement 20Na decays to an excited state of 20Ne through the emission of positrons of maximum kinetic energy 5.55 MeV. The excited state decays by ##\alpha## emission to the ground state of...

Homework Statement What is the kinetic energy given to the proton in the decay of a neutron when: a) The electron has negligibly small kinetic energy b) The neutrino has negligibly small kinetic energy Homework Equations Q = (mn - mp - me - mv ) c2 = .782MeV Where T is kinetic energy, and...

These questions came to mind after my physics teacher told us that a neutron is actually a "proton-electron" pair. He then said in beta minus decay, when the neutron decays, the electron is released and only the proton remains. I'm pretty sure this is incorrect, though, but can any confirm it...

When dealing with a beta ^+ decay in the calculation of the disintegration energy Q, one includes the mass of 2 electrons. But the output result is 1 electron in the fundamental reaction: p => n + ( e^+ ) + v Where the neutron n has a neutral charge and the neutrino v has Z = 0. So why does...

Are there equations that detail the stability of nuclei against beta decay? On a related point, I'm familiar with the chart that shows all the isotopes and their half-lives (with a good chunk undergoing beta decay), but I was wondering if that can be derived from first principles, just using the...

Hi, I recently bought a glow-in-the-dark key chain, similar to http://tinyurl.com/zqf5sxb (image link). It is made from solid plexiglass, with a hollow cylinder in the middle, containing tritium. The electrons from the beta decay presumably hit a fluorescent wall on the inside of the cylinder...

The mass of a neutron is approximately 1.674927471×10−27 kg, but is this always the case? For example if a neutron undergoes negative beta decay (i.e. an electron and an electron anti-neutrino is emitted) and then positive beta decay, will this not mean that the final mass of the neutron is now...

I read that CP-symmetry violation occurs (or can occur) in beta decay. Does that mean that, since CPT-symmetry must hold, there is no T-symmetry?

Homework Statement Find the ##Q## value for electron capture of ##^{196}Au##. Homework Equations ##Q_\epsilon = [m(^AX)-m(^AX')]c^2-B_n## The Attempt at a Solution How do I know if I have an ##K##- or ##L##-shell for the electron? Assuming I have an ##K## shell taking ##B_n = \; ^{196m1}Au##...

The electron created and emitted in the beta decay of a proton has an initial velocity close to the speed of light. When I try to calculate, not taking into account relativity, the force needed to accelerate an electron to that velocity over a distance the size of a proton, I get about 45 N...

Some nuclides undergo decay of electron capture or beta plus. Can electron beam with appropriate energy accelerate electron capture beta decay? Same scenario: If I am looking for something, and my friend kindly hands it over to me, then I say thanks, because my seeking time is shorten.