and sugar cubes to simulate the radioactive decay of different isotopes. A radioactive isotope's nucleus is unstable and spontaneously decays, giving off radiation and changing into a different ...

Save guides, add subjects and pick up where you left off with your BBC account. Radioactive decay is a spontaneous and random process. A block of radioactive material will contain many trillions ...

^{4}\textrm{He}\) When a radioactive atom emits an alpha particle the mass number decreases by four and the atomic number drops by two. Here is the equation for the alpha decay of radon-219 into ...