alpha decay
A final effect of this trapped radiation merits mention. Alpha decay produces helium nuclei, which form helium atoms when they are stopped and capture electrons. Most of the helium on Earth is obtained from wells and is produced in this manner. Any helium in the atmosphere will escape in geologically short times because of its high thermal velocity. What patterns and insights are gained from an examination of the binding energy of various nuclides? First, we find that BE is approximately proportional to the number of nucleons A in any nucleus. About twice as much energy is needed to pull apart a nucleus like 24 Mg compared with pulling apart 12 C , for example. To help us look at other effects, we divide BE by A and consider the binding energy per nucleon, BE / A . The graph of BE / A in Figure 31.27 reveals some very interesting aspects of nuclei. We see that the binding energy per nucleon averages about 8 MeV, but is lower for both the lightest and heaviest nuclei. This overall trend, in which nuclei with A equal to about 60 have the greatest BE / A and are thus the most tightly bound, is due to the combined characteristics of the attractive nuclear forces and the repulsive Coulomb force. It is especially important to note two thingsthe strong nuclear force is about 100 times stronger than the Coulomb force, and the nuclear forces are shorter in range compared to the Coulomb force. So, for low-mass nuclei, the nuclear attraction dominates and each added nucleon forms bonds with all others, causing progressively heavier nuclei to have progressively greater values of BE / A . This continues up to A 60 , roughly corresponding to the mass number of iron. Beyond that, new nucleons added to a nucleus will be too far from some others to feel their nuclear attraction. Added protons, however, feel the repulsion of all other protons, since the Coulomb force is longer in range. Coulomb repulsion grows for progressively heavier nuclei, but nuclear attraction remains about the same, and so BE / A becomes smaller. This is why stable nuclei heavier than A 40 have more neutrons than protons. Coulomb repulsion is reduced by having more neutrons to keep the protons farther apart see Figure 31.28 .