191k views
3 votes
Nitrogen-13 emits beta radiation and decays to carbon-13 with a half life of 10

minutes. Assume a starting mass of 2.00 g of nitrogen-13.
(Use to answer the questions below.)
How long is three half-lives in the example above? *

User Onqtam
by
4.1k points

2 Answers

1 vote

Answer:

From the Question....

A half life is 10minutes...

3half lives would be a total of 30minutes.

User Nadun
by
4.6k points
3 votes

Three half-lives for Nitrogen-13, with a half-life of 10 minutes, amount to a total time of 30 minutes.

The student is asking how long three half-lives are for Nitrogen-13, which has a half-life of 10 minutes.

In the example given, one full half-life passage would result in half the starting mass, leading to 1 g of Nitrogen-13 after 10 minutes.

After two half-lives (20 minutes total), the amount would again halve to 0.5 g.

Then, after three half-lives (30 minutes total), we would expect the amount to halve once more, leaving 0.25 g of Nitrogen-13 from the initial 2.00 g.

This can also be illustrated by the provided example with tritium, where each half-life results in the mass being halved consecutively at set time intervals.

User Tony Blanco
by
4.2k points