How is the half-life of carbon-14 used for dating archaeological samples?

1 Answer
Sanjay Kamath
Aug 16, 2016

By knowing half life we can estimate the age of the sample.

Explanation:

Radiocarbon dating.is a technique for determining the age of organic materials, such as wood, based on their content of the radioisotope 14C acquired from the atmosphere when they formed part of a living plant. The 14C decays to the nitrogen isotope 14N with a half-life of 5730 years.

Related questions
See all questions in Fossils
Impact of this question
2394 views around the world
You can reuse this answer
Creative Commons License