Nuclear transmutations, artificial

Einsteinium does not exist in nature and is not found in the Earth s crust. It is produced in small amounts by artificial nuclear transmutations of other radioactive elements rather than by additional explosions of thermonuclear weapons. The formation of einsteinium from decay processes of other radioactive elements starts with plutonium and proceeds in five steps as follows ... 

Another type of radioactivity, known as nuclear transmutation, results from the bombardment of nuclei by neutrons, protons, or other nuclei An example of a nuclear transmutation is the conversion of atmospheric to gC and H, which results when the nitrogen isotope captures a neutron (from the sun). In some cases, heavier elements are synthesized from hghter elements. This type of transmutation occurs naturally in outer space, but it can also be achieved artificially, as we will see in Section 23.4. 

Lord Rutherford and his group of scientists were the first persons to produce and detect artificial nuclear transmutations in 1919. He bombarded nitrogen in the air with the a-particles emitted in the decay of Po. The transmutation reaction involved the absorption of an a-particle by the nuclei to produce and a proton (a hydrogen nucleus). This reaction can be written as... 

Natural Radioactivity and Nuclear Transmutation Unstable nuclei undergo spontaneous decay with the emission of radiation and particles. All nuclear decays obey first-order kinetics. The half-lives of several radioactive nuclei have been used to date objects. Stable nuclei can also be made radioactive by bombardment with elementary particles or atomic nuclei. Many new elements have been created artificially in particle accelerators where such bombardments occur. 

Nuclear fission refers to splitting a (large) nucleus into two smaller ones, not including the tiny particles listed in Table 22-3. Nuclear fusion refers to the combination of small nuclei to make a larger one. Both of these types of processes are included in the term artificial transmutation. 

Using the elements mentioned in Section 22-13, induced radiation and the artificial transmutation of elements occur with both light elements, like the nonmetals 3H, 12C and 170 as well has heavier elements, like 97Tc, mFr, 210At and 239U, which can be metals, metalloids or nonmetals. Transuranium elements, i.e. the elements with atomic numbers greater than 92 (uranium), must be prepared by nuclear bombardment of other elements. 

Ernest Rutherford, Frederick Soddy, and then Sir William Ramsay documented natural transformations of one element into another in 1902 and 1903. The artificial transmutation of one element into another, however, was first accomplished in 1919 by Rutherford, a physicist. Indeed, the field of nuclear physics has contributed the most to our understanding of the subatomic world since the 1920s. But the scientists who most advocated transmutation as a goal of research and a heuristic principle for understanding the nature of matter—the Nobel Prize winners Ramsay and Soddy, and, in a less prominent way, Sir William Crookes—were chemists, not physicists.1... 

Neither californium nor its compounds are found in nature. All of its isotopes are produced artificially in extremely small amounts, and all of them are extremely radioactive. All of its isotopes are produced by the transmutation from other elements such as berkelium and americium. Following is the nuclear reaction that transmutates californium-250 into cahfornium-252 Cf + (neutron and A, gamma rays) — Cf + (neutron and A, gamma rays) —> Cf. 

ATOMIC SPECIES. A distinctive type of atom. The basis of differentiation between atoms is (1) mass, (2) atomic number, or number of positive nuclear charges, (3) nuclear excitation energy. The reason for recognizing this third class is because certain atoms are known, chiefly among those obtained by artificial transmutation, which have the same atomic (isotopic) mass and atomic number, but differ in energetics. 

TRANSMUTATION. The natural or artificial transformation of atoms of one element into atoms of a different element as the result of a nuclear reaction. The reaction may be one in which two nuclei interact, as in the formation of oxygen from nitrogen and helium nuclei (/3-particles), or one in which a nucleus reacts widi an elementary particle such as a neutron or proton. Thus, a sodium atom and a proton form a magnesium atom. Radioactive decay, e.g., of uranium, can be regarded as a type of transmutation. The first transmutation was performed bv the English physicist Rutherford in 1919. 

Note that in equation (10), as in the other nuclear equations listed, atomic numbers and mass numbers are both conserved. This reaction was the first artificial transmutation, carried out (as contrasted to spontaneous transmutations or natural radioactivity in which one nucleus is transformed to another, irrespective of the influence of man). The a particle in equation (10) is the projectile and the nitrogen nucleus the target. 

The first indication of the modern concept of an element is to be found as early as Boyle (1627-1691), who was, however, far in advance of his time. Lavoisier (1743-1794) gives the purely empirical definition of an element, still valid in chemistry, as a substance which cannot be divided by any means or by any conversion. We must make an exception at present only for nuclear processes in which, both in natural radioactivity and in artificial processes brought about by neutrons, protons, etc., transmutation of the elements can take place. 

The concept of artificial transmutation can be applied to reactions that involve nuclear fission or the splitting of nuclei. An example of this is the fission reaction that occurs in an atomic bomb. When U-235 is bombarded with a neutron, the uranium is split according to the reaction ... 

This misuse of the word radioactivity causes many people to incorrectly think of radioactivity as something one can get by being near radioactive materials. There is only one process which behaves anything like that, and it is called artificially induced radioactivity, a process mainly carried out in research laboratories. When some materials are bombarded with protons, neutrons, or other nuclear particles of appropriate energy, their nuclei may be transmuted, creating unstable isotopes which are radioactive. 

These reactions are examples of artificial transmutation—the change of one element into another. Several small particles, in addition to those involved in natural radioactivity, are involved in artificial nuclear reactions. Some of these additional particles are listed in Table 21.4. They are used as projectiles to bombard nuclei or are produced along with other products of such reactions, or both. 

Nuclear chemistry (radiochemistry) has now become a large and very important branch of science. Over four hundred radioactive isotopes have been made in the laboratory, whereas only about three hundred stable isotopes have been detected in nature. Three elements —technetium (43), astatine (85), and promethium (61), as well as some trans-uranium elements, seem not to occur in nature, and are available only as products of artificial transmutation. The use of radioactive isotopes as tracers has become a valuable technique in scientific and medical research. The controlled release of nuclear energy promises to lead us into a new world, in which the achievement of man is no longer limited by the supply of energy available to him. 

Nuclei with Atomic Number Greater Than 83 Detection of Radiation Rates of Decay and Half-Life Disintegration Series Uses of Radionuclides Artificial Transmutations of Elements Nuclear Fission Nuclear Fission Reactors Nuclear Fusion... 

Artificial transmutation An artificially induced nuclear reaction caused by bombardment of a nucleus with subatomic particles or small nuclei. 

In ordinary chemical reactions, chemical bonds in the reactant species are broken, the atoms rearrange, and new chemical bonds are formed in the product species. These changes only affect an atom s electrons there is no change to the nucleus. Hence there is no change in an elements identity. On the other hand, nuclear reactions refer to changes in an atom s nucleus (whether or not there are electrons attached). In most nuclear reactions, the number of protons in the nucleus changes, which means that elements are changed, or transmuted, into different elements. There are several ways in which transmutation can occur. Some transmutations occur naturally, while others only occur artificially in nuclear reactors or particle accelerators. 

Elements also are transmuted into other elements by nuclear fission and fusion. Fission is the breakup of very large nuclei (at least as heavy as uranium) into smaller nuclei, as in the fission of U-236 in the following reaction 22f U IE Kr + 12 Ba + 3n, where n is the symbol for a neutron (charge = 0, mass number = +1). In fusion, nuclei combine to form larger nuclei, as in the fusion of hydrogen isotopes to make helium. Energy may also be released during both fission and fusion. These events may occur naturally—fusion is the process that powers the Sun and all other stars—or they may be made to occur artificially. 

Equations for Nuclear Reactions 26-13 Artificial Transmutations of Elements... 

Geiger and Marsden continued to study the deflection of a-particles, and in 1913 (after observing over 100,000 scintillations at a rate of 5 to 90 per minute) correlated nuclear charge with atomic number. In 1914 and 1915 Marsden continued to study the impact of a-particles on matter these experiments led to Rutherford s 1919 fortuitous attainment of the alchemist s dream the artificial transmutation of the elements. 

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