Happy fish, dead fish, BEEEES!

Today we learned that radioactivity, the starting block of nuclear weapons and so on, was discovered by accident by Henry Bacquerel in 1896! Apparently, he had put a photographic plate in a drawer along with some uranium, and the next day, he discovered that they had been developed bye uranium's radioactivity. With this story, we jumped headfirst into the world of radioactivity, which is a spontaneous emission of particles and/or radiation from unstable nuclei. We were introduced to alpha, beta, and gamma particles.

Alpha decay, whose product isotope is called the daughter, can be blocked by paper. This process resembles a nucleus "coughing up" helium nucleus.

Beta decay, which can be stopped by concrete, is when a neutron turns into a proton.

Gamma decay, which has the highest amount of energy, can be blocked by lead.

Nuclear fission is when an atom splits into smaller atoms, while nuclear fusion is when atoms combine on the sun or in particle accelerators. These are both types of nuclear bombardment.

There are many stereotypes about radioactivity. Many, including myself until now, stereotypically think that radioactive elements glow green all the time. This can also be seen in one Simpsons episode when the whole town gets scared of an alien that is actually Mr. Burns on medication. Another interesting story we learned along with Henry's discovery by accident was about the radium girls. Watches were once painted with glow-in-the-dark paint. This paint was actually radioactive, but women who were assigned jobs to paint these watches put the paint in the mouths while sharpening the point of their paintbrushes as well as on their body for fun. Of course, this resulted in much damage to their health. :( What's sadder is that scientists knew about the detrimental effects of this spontaneously glowing paint, but they still allowed many people to suffer. All in all, radioactivity has a long history of accidents and harm.