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flintstones
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- I'm trying to write some nuclear decay questions for my students where they have to use conservation of momentum and conservation of mass-energy to solve problems, but I don't know if it's true that all the released energy is in the form of kinetic energy.
I'm trying to make up an example for my students to illustrate that in nuclear decay, mass-energy and momentum are both conserved.
I found this problem: https://physics.stackexchange.com/q...ate-velocity-of-radon-220-nuclear-after-decay
I am trying to modify it so that they have to use both mass-energy and momentum to solve. I wanted them to try calculating the radon's speed using momentum. Then I wanted them to show that if you add up the kinetic energies of the alpha and the radon after the decay, that energy is equal to the mass difference. (In the problem given, this is not true, so I need to modify the numbers).
However, I never took a university course in nuclear decay and realized that perhaps my thinking is wrong. I am assuming that all of the released energy becomes kinetic energy of the products. Is that wrong?
I found this problem: https://physics.stackexchange.com/q...ate-velocity-of-radon-220-nuclear-after-decay
I am trying to modify it so that they have to use both mass-energy and momentum to solve. I wanted them to try calculating the radon's speed using momentum. Then I wanted them to show that if you add up the kinetic energies of the alpha and the radon after the decay, that energy is equal to the mass difference. (In the problem given, this is not true, so I need to modify the numbers).
However, I never took a university course in nuclear decay and realized that perhaps my thinking is wrong. I am assuming that all of the released energy becomes kinetic energy of the products. Is that wrong?
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