Question

Half life of radium is 44 years.The sample will reduce to 50% of its orignal value after how many years?

Answer 1

44 years

Answer 2

I have confusion regarding this question that in one of my book its answer is 44year while in other its answer is 22 year.

please help.

Answer 3

Faryal ilyas

Answer 4

[AI-generated answer — Explain Bot]

To calculate the time it takes for a sample of radium to reduce to 50% of its original value, we need to use the concept of half-life.

The half-life is the time it takes for half of the radioactive atoms in a substance to decay. In this case, the half-life of radium is given as 44 years, which means that after 44 years, half of the radium atoms in a sample will have decayed.

To find the time it takes for the sample to reduce to 50% of its original value, we need to calculate how many half-lives have elapsed. Since each half-life reduces the sample by half, we need to determine the number of times we can divide the sample size by 2 until we reach 50%.

Let's do the calculation:

1st half-life: 50% of the original value
2nd half-life: 25% of the original value
3rd half-life: 12.5% of the original value
4th half-life: 6.25% of the original value

By the 4th half-life, the sample has reduced to 6.25% of its original value. We can notice that after the 3rd half-life, the value is still above 50%.

Therefore, we can conclude that it takes 4 half-lives for the sample to reduce to 50% of its original value. Since the half-life of radium is 44 years, multiply 44 years by 4 to get the answer.

44 years * 4 = 176 years

So, the sample will reduce to 50% of its original value after approximately 176 years.