Measuring Radioactivity - Video Tutorials & Practice Problems

Measuring Radioactivity Concept 1

here. We're going to say that radiation can be measured in several different ways, depending on which property is being measured. So here, we're gonna have units of radiation measurement. And what we need to realize is that there are a lot of common units used for radiation. We have curie we have road engine, we have rats and we have rent. All right. So let's start out with our curious, We're gonna stay here. That one curie is equal to 3.7 times 10 to the 10. Disintegration is per second. And we're going to say that the S. I. Unit is one back quarrel, which is B. Q. So, I'm gonna butcher some of these because the names are a little bit different than what we're used to seeing. So we're gonna say that one B. Q. Is equal to one disintegration per second. And we're going to say here, what property is it measuring? We're going to say that it's measuring decaying events or decay events. Next we have one road engine, which is our capital. Are we going to say that one religion is equal to 2.1 times 10 to the nine charges per centimeters cubed here. We don't have an S. I. Unit equivalent to it. And we need to realize here, it deals with the exposure in terms of ionizing intensity of gamma and X rays. Next we're going to say we have rads. So we're gonna stay here. One rat is equal to one times 10 to the negative five jewels over grams. And that one rat is equal to one capital are, so it's equal to one road trip. All right. Next, we're going to say the S. I. Unit equivalent of that is gray or G. Y. We're gonna stay here. That one grey is equal to one jewel over kilograms and it's also equal to one rad. So you can start seeing that some of these units are connected to one another. This will allow us later on to convert from one radiation unit to another. Now here this is deals with energy absorbed by tissue. Then we have remar M. REMS equals reds times R. B. E. T. R. B. Is your relative biological effectiveness. We're gonna say the S. I. Unit of that is our subvert or S. V. Um One Sievert is equal to 100 R. E. M. And then we're gonna say what exactly um is a property measuring, it's measuring tissue damage. Now finally coming back to our B. E. Which is your relative biological effectiveness. It factors account for both your ionizing intensity and biological effect. And we're gonna say here that X rays were going to say here gamma rays were going to say here beta particles there are B. E. Is equal to one, and when it comes to alfa particles, which are larger, there are B. E. Is equal to 20. So here these are the most important types of radiation units that you should keep in mind. Um, realize only the ones that are in purple. Remember our purple boxes are the ones that are important in terms of memorization. The others would be given to you in some way, either in a formula sheet or within the question itself.

Measuring Radioactivity Example 1

The initial responders of Chernobyl nuclear disaster were exposed to SVS of radiation, convert this value to R E. M. All right. So what all we gotta do here is use the conversion factor and realize 23 SV. The conversion factor is That for every one SV we have 100 r e M. S. So when we do that, SPS cancel out and we'll be off with r E. M. At the end. This comes out to 2300 r E. M. As the new units for radiation.

Two technicians in a nuclear laboratory were accidentally exposed to radiation. If one was exposed to 5 mGy and the other to 9 rad, which technician received more radiation?

• A. The one exposed to 5 mGy
• B. The one exposed to 9 rad
• C. The two technicians were exposed to the same amount of radiation

A solution of iodine-131, a radioisotope used in the diagnosis and treatment of thyroid disease, is found just prior to administration to have an activity of 1.08 x 10⁶ Bq/mL. If 2.57 mL were delivered intravenously to the patient, what dose of I-131 ( in µCi) did the patient receive?

• A. 7.50×10^–5 µCi
• B. 75.0 µCi
• C. 29.2 µCi
• D. 0.075 µCi
• E. 0.029 µCi