The half life of a neutron is 800 sec. 10^8 neutrons at a certain instant are projected from one space station towards another, situated 3200 km away,with a velocity 2000 m/s. their velocity remains constant during the journey.how many neutrons reach the station? divide your answer by 10^6 .
PS: i request you to post a solution too!
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thanks abhineet!this is a class 12th radioactive decay problem.
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Woah!! Lol...thnx for that @Ishita Bhatia , i feel a bit more confident now:-D
but its not important that the final neutrons should be half of the number of neutrons in the half life. i suggest if you have a look at the law of radioactive decay. your answer might just be a coincidence.
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But isn't it true that half life is the time after which the total number of entities gets halved????
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yes abhineet, but in the nuclear reactions and radioactive decay, they follow certain different laws. if u really love science, you might feel like having a look over them ;)
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@Ishita Bhatia – Sure, Thanks for the guidance @Ishita Bhatia :) I would definitely look over them...
The velocity of neutrons are too small to use Lorentz's factor, so we use classical mechanic.
Time for the neutrons to reach the space station is t = 2 0 0 0 3 2 0 0 × 1 0 3 = 1 6 0 0 seconds.
Using radioactive decay law:
N ( t ) = N 0 e − t 1 / 2 ln 2 t
With t 1 / 2 = 8 0 0 seconds and N 0 = 1 0 8 neutrons, we got N ( t ) = 2 5 × 1 0 6 neutrons ⟹ the answer is 2 5 .
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T o t a l d i s t a n c e t o b e c o v e r e d = 3 2 0 0 K m = 3 2 0 0 × 1 0 3 S p e e d = 2 0 0 0 m / s T i m e t a k e n = s p e e d d i s t a n c e c o v e r e d = 2 0 0 0 3 2 0 0 × 1 0 3 = 1 6 0 0 s e c o n d N o w t o t a l n e u t r o n s = 1 0 8 S i n c e h a l f l i f e = 8 0 0 s e c o n d , t h e n a d t e r 8 0 0 s e c o n d , r e m a i n i n g n e u t r o n s = 0 . 5 × 1 0 8 = 5 × 1 0 7 A f t e r 1 6 0 0 s e c o n d , r e m a i n i n g n e u t r o n s = 0 . 5 × 5 × 1 0 7 = 2 5 × 1 0 6 A f t e r d i d v i n g w i t h 1 0 6 , a n s w e r = 2 5