Back to the full dot-point answer
VICPhysicsQuick questions
Unit 1: What ideas explain the physical world?
Quick questions on Half-life and uses of radioactive decay (VCE Physics Unit 1)
4short Q&A pairs drawn directly from our worked dot-point answer. For full context and worked exam questions, read the parent dot-point page.
What is treating decay as linear?Show answer
Half of the remaining sample decays each half-life, not half of the original. After two half-lives, $25$% remains.
What is mixing units of time?Show answer
$T_{1/2}$ and $t$ must be in the same units.
What is using $\lambda = T_{1/2} / \ln 2$?Show answer
It is the other way: $\lambda = \ln 2 / T_{1/2}$.
What is treating activity as constant?Show answer
Activity drops exponentially along with the number of nuclei.
Have a question we have not covered?
This dot-point answer is short enough that we have not extracted many short questions yet. Read the full dot-point answer or ask Mo, our study assistant, in the chat for follow ups.