核能发电工程核原则.pdfVIP

RADIOACTIVE DECAY 147 particles of energy around 4 MeV with a halflife of 1.405 x 1010 years, while 218Th emits particles of energy of about 10 MeV and has a half-life of only 0.11 sec. To further illustrate this point, the energy and halflives of the 238U decay series (shown in Fig. 4-12) are plotted in Fig. 4-14 indicating similar correlation between energy of the particle and halflives of the nuclides. Why in some cases decay takes billions of years when it is driven by the process involving the particle energy of the order of MeV? The mechanism of decay as well as the observed relation is explained by considering the particle as being bound in the potential of the nucleus (see Fig. 4-15). Alpha particles in a level with negative energy cannot penetrate the Coulomb barrier, but those in a positive energy level may have enough energy to overcome the barrier and exit the nucleus. The region between -a and +a in Fig. 4-15 represents the inner part of the nucleus where particles are bound by a strong nuclear potential. The regions left and right are governed by the Coulomb repulsive potential between the charge of the particle, +2e , and the charge of the remaining nucleus, +(Z 2)e. 1.E+19 238U 1.E+16 1.E+13 1.E+10 ) c e s ( e f 1.E+07 i l - f l a H 1.E+04 1.E+01 1.E-02 214Po 1.E-05 4 4.5 5 5.5 6 6.5 7