Alpha particles can be stopped by a few centimeters of air, or even a sheet of paper, or your skin. Radioactivity has the potential to damage the cells in living tissue, to varying degrees. The particles can be alpha particles or beta particles, while the radiation is gamma-radiation. The core or nucleus of an unstable atom loses some energy by squirting it out as either particles or radiation. In general, radioactivity happens in atoms that are unstable. The previously undiscovered radiation from the uranium was doing the fogging. In that year, the French scientist, Henri Becquerel, discovered that uranium ores had the power to fog up photographic plates. Radioactivity has been around almost since the Big Bang, but we began to understand it only in 1896. Indeed, the phrase "glow in the dark" is used as a metaphor for radioactivity. The radioactive material he accidentally flips down the back of his shirt is quite clearly glowing green - so there's one undeniable example of radioactivity having a green glow.Īnd even back in the real world, hospital patients will laconically say that they've had so many X-rays that they glow in the dark. Homer Simpson downs tools when the knocking-off bell rings at the nuclear power plant where he works. Most of us have seen the opening sequence of any episode of The Simpsons. We may not all be nuclear scientists, but most of us are pretty sure about one piece of nuclear knowledge - we all reckon that "radioactivity has a green glow". Audio: Green glow of radiation (ABC Science).
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