Carbon-14 has a half-life of 5730 years. In a plant fossil, you find that the $^{14} C$ $""^14C$ has decayed to 1/32.0 of the original amount. How long ago was this plant alive?

Question

Explain it to me how to do it. I'm confused

30353 views around the world

You can reuse this answer
Creative Commons License

Answer 1 · 2018-05-17T15:37:10

$28560$ $28560$ years.. (Gosh.. I will die of boredom if I have to wait for that long)

Per Half Life, The Specimen Decays by half the amount present previously.

As, $\frac{1}{32} = {(\frac{1}{2})}^{5}$ $1/32 = (1/2)^5$ ,

The Carbon-14 specimen has undergone $5$ $5$ half-lives.

The Half-Life of Carbon-14 is = $5730$ $5730$ years.

So, 5 half-lives of Carbon-14 is = $5 \cdot 5730$ $5 * 5730$ years = $28650$ $28650$ years.

Hope this helps.