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Home Q & A Board Science-Related Homework Help Physics
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barry barry
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10 years ago
Explain how radioactive dating works, and why it works only with igneous rocks.
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10 years ago
Radioactive dating compares the amount of a radio isotope left in a rock with its decay product; the older the rock, the less original radioactive material remains, and the more decay product has built up.  Since this rate of decay is steady and predictable, that will let us get the age of an igneous rock.  The igneous rocks have not been changed since they crystallized; metamorphic ones have often been heated enough to recrystalize minerals and reset the atomic clock, while sedimentary rocks are mixtures of many specimens of differing ages.
Would you know my name, if I saw you in heaven?

Eric Clapton
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barry Authorbarry
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10 years ago
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