Ask Science
Ask a science question, get a science answer.
Community Rules
Rule 1: Be respectful and inclusive.
Treat others with respect, and maintain a positive atmosphere.
Rule 2: No harassment, hate speech, bigotry, or trolling.
Avoid any form of harassment, hate speech, bigotry, or offensive behavior.
Rule 3: Engage in constructive discussions.
Contribute to meaningful and constructive discussions that enhance scientific understanding.
Rule 4: No AI-generated answers.
Strictly prohibit the use of AI-generated answers. Providing answers generated by AI systems is not allowed and may result in a ban.
Rule 5: Follow guidelines and moderators' instructions.
Adhere to community guidelines and comply with instructions given by moderators.
Rule 6: Use appropriate language and tone.
Communicate using suitable language and maintain a professional and respectful tone.
Rule 7: Report violations.
Report any violations of the community rules to the moderators for appropriate action.
Rule 8: Foster a continuous learning environment.
Encourage a continuous learning environment where members can share knowledge and engage in scientific discussions.
Rule 9: Source required for answers.
Provide credible sources for answers. Failure to include a source may result in the removal of the answer to ensure information reliability.
By adhering to these rules, we create a welcoming and informative environment where science-related questions receive accurate and credible answers. Thank you for your cooperation in making the Ask Science community a valuable resource for scientific knowledge.
We retain the discretion to modify the rules as we deem necessary.
view the rest of the comments
Idea have been summoned.
Any type of decay, either that be uranium (U) strontium (Sr) thalium (Th), it is caused by an imbalance of radionuclide's (protons and neutrons) in the nucleus. This is not to confuse with an imbalance of protons and electrons which changes the charge. Basically the nucleus wants to be balanced (IE: x amount of protons and neutrons). If there's an imbalance of radionuclide's in the nucleus, it will emit them as forms of radiation.
There are three kinds of radiation that can be emitted by a radioactive isotope; alpha, beta, and gamma.
alpha radiation is the heaviest of the three, containing two protons and two neutrons, it is also the weakest in penetrating power because of how much mass it has. You may have also noticed that alpha radiation takes the form of a helium nucleus from its proton-neutron count, that's because alpha radiation is a helium nucleus!
Beta radiation is comprised of two forms beta plus (B+) and beta minus (B-). B+ is a positron and it's a very uncommon form of radiation. I think carbon-13 is an emitter of B+. B-, on the contrary, is an electron and is far more common/abundant across many radioactive isotopes. Th-204, is, approximately, a B- only emitter. U-238 is also a B- emitter.
Gamma radiation doesn't have any mass, and is light making it the most potent of the three.
Now to answer your questions:
"What happened to the respective electrons?" I think your confusing the difference of a helium nucleus and a helium atom, the helium nucleus indicates the number of neutrons and protons, it does not include the orbiting electrons of which the atom does includ. Alpha radiation is a helium nucleus not a helium atom
"Does this mean that each uranium atom, with 92 protons, entirely splits into 46 helium nucleei or does it release some number of helium nucleei leaving another element behind?" I highly recommend looking at the U-238 decay chain wikipedia article, it Illistrates how the decay chain process actually works. To answer your question, U-238 releases a helium nuclei during its decay chain process leaving strontium-xyz (forgot the isotope name).
"How does the concept of half life play into this?" Half-life states that for a given radioactive isotope how long does it take for that isotope to decay half of it's initial quantity. I think for uranium-238 it's 4.5 billion years or 9 billion years to fully deplete itself of any radiation.