I get radiation is basically light…..some we some we don’t. And the more intense it is the worse it is. So if a thing has become radioactive, is it basically glowing? And how is that happening? What is the energy source?
In: Planetary Science
When something is “radioactive”, that means that the nuclei of the atoms in this substance are unstable. They either have too many or too few neutrons and thus the nuclei can’t stay together. A nucleus in that situation is going to undergo some kind of nuclear reaction to achieve stability, with the most common being radioactive decay. This is when bits and pieces of the nucleus are being spat out to get to that ideal combination of protons and neutrons. Those high energy particles are the most damaging type of ionizing radiation. They are alpha particles (two protons and two neutrons), beta particles (1 electron), and free neutrons. What you’re thinking of when you say “radiation is basically light” is electromagnetic radiation. That is also created in radioactive decay, called gamma radiation.
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