Unit 15 · Modern Physics

Chapter 15.4

The Nucleus: Radioactive Decay, Fission, and Fusion

A nucleus weighs less than the protons and neutrons that make it, and that missing mass is the energy holding it together. Release a little of it and you have a star, or a bomb.

in preparation · lesson 27 of 27

By the end

  1. 01Apply conservation of nucleon number, charge, and lepton number to alpha, beta, and gamma decay
  2. 02Describe the strong force and use mass–energy equivalence in fission, fusion, and decay
  3. 03Use half-life and exponential decay to predict what remains of a sample, or its age

In unit 15

  1. 15.1Light Comes in Lumps: Blackbody Radiation and the Photoelectric Effect
  2. 15.2Photons, Compton Scattering, and Matter Waves
  3. 15.3The Bohr Atom and Spectra
  4. 15.4The Nucleus: Radioactive Decay, Fission, and Fusion
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