Radiometric and radiocarbon dating
26-Jan-2020 14:15
The New Zealand physicist Ernest Rutherford, suggested in 1905 that the exact age of a rock could be measured by means of radioactivity.
For the first time he was able to exactly measure the age of a uranium mineral.
Any material which is composed of carbon may be dated.
It is based on the occurrence of a small fixed amount of the radioisotope Ar with a half-life of about 1,300 million years.
Quaternary geology provides a record of climate change and geologically recent changes in environment.
U-Pb geochronology of is used for determining the age of emplacement of igneous rocks of all compositions, ranging in age from Tertiary to Early Archean.
By measuring the C concentration or residual radioactivity of a sample whose age is not known, it is possible to obtain the number of decay events per gram of Carbon.
By comparing this with modern levels of activity (1890 wood corrected for decay to 1950 AD) and using the measured half-life it becomes possible to calculate a date for the death of the sample. As a result of atomic bomb usage, C ages of objects younger than 1950.The original atom is referred to as the parent and the following decay products are referred to as the daughter.
