Name:________________________________________ Period: ______ Date:________________

Nuclear Reactions and Radioactive Decay

1. This question is about radioactive decay.

A nucleus of the isotope xenon, Xe-131, is produced when a nucleus of the radioactive isotope
iodine I-131 decays.

(a) Explain the term isotopes.

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(b) Fill in the boxes below in order to complete the nuclear reaction equation for this decay.

131 131
I Xe + – +
54

(c) The activity A of a freshly prepared sample of the iodine isotope is 3.2 × 105 Bq. The
variation of the activity A with time t is shown below.

3.5

3.0

2.5

2.0
5
A /10 Bq
1.5

1.0

0.5

0
0 5.0 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45
t / days

Draw a best-fit line for the data points.

(d) Use the graph to estimate the half-life of I-131.

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Name:________________________________________ Period: ______ Date:________________

2. Nuclear reactions

(a) (i) State what is meant by radioactive decay.

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(ii) Radioactive decay is said to be a random process. State what is meant by random
decay.

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(b) In 1919, Rutherford was investigating the bombardment of nitrogen by α-particles. He

discovered that, in the interaction between an α-particle and a nitrogen nucleus, the
nitrogen nucleus was transformed into an oxygen nucleus with the emission of a proton.

(i) Complete the nuclear reaction equation for this transformation.

14
7 N  42 He  
 O 
 
 p

(ii) The rest masses of the particles shown in the reaction equation are given in the
table below.

particle rest mass / u

He 4.00260

N 14.00307

O 16.99913

p 1.00783

Calculate the minimum energy, in MeV, of an -particle required to cause this

transformation to occur. Explain your answer.

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Name:________________________________________ Period: ______ Date:________________

3. This question is about nuclear energy.

(a) Define nuclear binding energy.

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(b) A neutron collides with a nucleus of uranium-235 and the following reaction takes place.

92 U  0 n  37 Rb  138
55Cs  20 n
235 1 96 1

State the name of this type of reaction. ........................... ...........................

(c) The mass of nuclei can be expressed in terms of unified mass units (u).

(i) Define the term unified mass unit.

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(ii) Using the data below, calculate the energy, in MeV, that is released in the reaction.
92U  235.0439u
mass of 235 mass of 01n 1.0087u
37Rb  95.9342u 55Cs 137.9112u
96 138
mass of mass of

(d) Explain the importance of the two neutrons produced in the reaction.

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(e) Each neutron accounts for about 2 MeV of the energy released in the reaction. Suggest
what accounts for the rest of the energy released.

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Name:________________________________________ Period: ______ Date:________________

(f) The reaction in (b) is more likely to take place if the colliding neutron has an energy of
about 0.1 eV. In certain types of nuclear reactors in which this reaction might take place,
the neutrons produced have their energy reduced by collisions with nuclei of graphite
(12C). The law of conservation of momentum can be used to estimate the number of
collisions required to reduce the energy of the neutrons to 0.1 eV.

State the law of conservation of momentum.

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(g) A neutron has a kinetic energy of 2.00 MeV. Deduce that the speed of the neutron is 1.95 
107 m s−1.

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Name:________________________________________ Period: ______ Date:________________

(h) You may assume that the mass of a nucleus of graphite is twelve times the mass of a
neutron. In a certain collision between a neutron and a stationary graphite nucleus, the
neutron of kinetic energy 2.00 MeV, rebounds from the graphite nucleus in a direction
along a line joining the centres of the nucleus and neutron.

1.95 10 7 m s –1 1.65 10 7 m s –1 v = 0.300 10 7 m s –1

graphite
neutron

before collision after collision

The rebound speed of the neutron is 1.65  107 m s−1.

(i) Deduce that the speed v of the graphite nucleus after collision is 0.300  107 m s−1.

(ii) Using your answer in (i), deduce whether the collision is elastic or inelastic.

(iii) Use your answer to (ii) to deduce that each time a neutron collides in this manner
with a graphite nucleus it loses about 30 of its kinetic energy.

(iv) State the fraction of the total initial energy lost by a neutron in its second collision
with a graphite nucleus.