[ RadSafe ] Half-lives

[Brennan, Mike (DOH)]

It depends on the field you are working in.  When I talk to medical
people, "long" is anything with a half-life greater than 90 days.
"Short" is measured in minutes or several hours.  When I do radon work,
"short" is in minutes, "long" is Pb-210 (22 years).  When I work in
environmental radiation, Co-60 (five years) is short, Cs-137 (about 30
years) is "medium".  "Long" is anything that is easier to express in
scientific notation.

-----Original Message-----
From: radsafe-bounces at radlab.nl [mailto:radsafe-bounces at radlab.nl] On
Behalf Of Steven Dapra
Sent: Friday, September 19, 2008 4:05 PM
To: radsafe at radlab.nl
Subject: [ RadSafe ] Half-lives

Sept. 19, 2008

	Is there a convention for dividing half-lives into groups for
very long (such as U-238), long, medium, short, and very short?  If
there is, what are the dividing points for the various lengths of time?

Steven Dapra
sjd at swcp.com

_______________________________________________
You are currently subscribed to the RadSafe mailing list

Before posting a message to RadSafe be sure to have read and understood
the RadSafe rules. These can be found at:
http://radlab.nl/radsafe/radsaferules.html

For information on how to subscribe or unsubscribe and other settings
visit: http://radlab.nl/radsafe/