Saved Bookmarks
| 1. |
Heavy radioactive nucleus decay through alpha-decay also. Consider a radioactive nucleus x. It spontaneously undergoes decay at rest resulting in the formationof a daughter nucleus y and the emission of an alpha- particle. The radioactivereaction can be given by x rarr y + alpha However , the nucleus y and the alpha- particle will be in motion. Then a natural question arises that what provides kinetic energy to the radioactive products. In fact, the difference of masses of the decaying nucleus and the decay products provides for the energy that is shared by the daughter nucleus and the alpha- particle as kinetic energy . We know that Einstein's mass-energy equivalence relation E = m c^(2). Let m_(x), m_(y) and m_(alpha) be the masses of the parent nucleus x, the daughter nucleus y and alpha- particle respectively. Also the kinetic energy of alpha- particle just after the decay is E_(0). Assuming all motion of to be non-relativistic. Just after the decy , if the speed of alpha- particle is v, then the speed of the centre of mass of the system of the daughter nucleud y and the alpha- particle will be |
|
Answer» V |
|