Half-Life Fun
3.961408126 10^30 g of an element is in a lab. After a certain amount of time, 1.50463277 10^-34 g of that element is left. The half-life of this element is 6 days. How many days have passed since the original amount of the element was left in the lab?
The answer is 1284.
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1 solution
To find the number of half-lives that have occurred, the following formula can be used: O/2^n=A (Where O = Amount of original substance, A = Amount of substance left, and n = the number of half-lives. So, to find the number of half-lives, the equation will be reduced to log2(O/A)=n (The 2 is the subscript). Then, using the output, multiply it by 10 to get the number of days the substance has been there