NUCLEAR PHYSICS, To many people this is an intimidating statement, but sometimes you will notice if you take a deeper look at something you find out it isn’t so bad at all. Lets take a look at an atom: (Helium) --->

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Atoms are made of three main components: Neutrons (no charge) protons (positive charge) and electrons (negative charge) The center of any atom is called the nucleus of the atom; this is made of neutrons and protons. Rotating around the nucleus are the electrons these are always going around in complicated wave patterns (You can learn more by researching quantum theory) Now, you would know that negatives and positives attract, this electrostatic force holds the atom together. To understand some of the more complex bits of the article you would need to understand how a neutron decays: Neutrons are made of little quarks but now I will not go into detail what quarks it is made of but the main point is that they are seething with energy (In other words they are unstable) so they eventually lose one of their quarks making them positive, amazingly this can take up to 15 minutes for a free neutron (neutron that is not part of atom)

Types of radiation and decay.

Before I go into that subject I would like to inform you that contradictory to what many may have told you a neutron is not a sort of radiation. Now that I have sorted that out, the first type I will be teaching you about is a gamma ray, (Yes same thing from The Hulk) to understand the rest of what I will be writing about I will quickly explain some facts about the photon, aphoton is the particle, (or if you want to be technical it can behave like a wave proved by Young’s experiment, But I’m not going to go into quantum physics) the frequency of that wave defines what it is classified as, for example a low frequency photon is called a radio wave, a moderate frequency photon is visible light, a high frequency photon is an x-ray and a very high frequency photon is a gamma ray. A photon is generated when a charged particle (an electron) changes its path rapidly. Explaining how an atom emits radiation is complex so lets start of with energy bands in an atom, when an electron “loses” energy it goes to the outer bands of the atom or on he outside, when it “gains” energy it jumps closer to the nucleus of the atom this “jump” emits radiation. Sadly gamma rays do NOT give you super powers, in fact more accurately they would kill you, this is because the higher the frequency of the photon the more dangerous it is to humans because that means the photon is hitting your cells more rapidly, in turn mutating them (Except this mutation will give you cancer and kill you slowly and painfully).

Our second form of radiation is the beta particle. This is purely an electron or a positron (Positively charged electron) detached from a nucleus, or a free electron (Don’t get this confused with another term used to describe weakly bonded electrons in materials like copper) Formerly, before we understand beta decay we need to under-stand what in the world the weak nuclear forces are, and what a neutron is composed of. First off the W- and W+ bosons (A boson is a force carrier), come in two forms, negative and positive (represented by – or +) and the Z boson. In the atom the nucleus is bound with these two forces, their like a string knotted around the nucleus binding it together. Then we come to the humble neutron, it is composed of one up-quark, each up-quark has a charge of +2/3 charge (The fraction is just how we represent the strength of the charge) and two down-quarks, having a negative charge and a spin of -1/3, this in turn means that the neutron has no charge. Back to beta decay, when the core of an atom is VERY heavy the W Z boson emit their energy faster and eventually the W- boson decays (It happens to decay faster) and changes the up quark (positively charged) (Charge depends on spin) into a down quark resulting in a proton to be produced. After all that drama has occurred in the nucleus something has to happen to the W- boson right? Well it does, in fact it decays into a few particles but the one we will be concentrating on is an electron (negatively charged). Now if you remember, I mentioned that even a positron con be produced, this is simply when a W+ boson particle decays, changing a proton into a neutron and the W+ boson decays into a positron. (This information will also be useful in the second paragraph).

Finally we come to the last form of radiation, which happens to be (drum roll please) the alpha particle! (Alpha, beta, Gamma!) The alpha particle is purely the nucleus of a helium atom (So no electrons) this is a not a dangerous form of radiation for humans unless it is inhaled, in which case it becomes very dangerous. It is produced when the neutron decays and turns into a proton, in turn making the nucleus unstable, it is then immediately emitted in pairs, and because protons cannot bind without neutrons because of the weak nuclear force, it also takes two neutrons along with it so that it can offset the ++ repulsive force in the nucleus. Isotopes To understand some other parts of this article learning what an isotope is, is essential. All isotopes of a single element have the same atomic number (protons) but they all have a different number of neutrons. Some examples of isotopes: Carbon 13, Carbon 14, Carbon 15 Carbon 16. Knowing that carbon has an atomic number of 6 (6 protons) we can work out the number of neutrons in such elements, the neutrons in any given element can be checked by the atomic number:

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What is fusion?

This is the most simple to explain and understand. Fusion in simple terms is the bonding of the nucleus of an atom. The byproduct of a fusion reaction depends on what goes into the reaction in the first place. Most fusion reactions on earth are normally tritium or deuterium fusion reactions. (Both are isotopes of hydrogen) this is because they are both the lightest elements that can fuse to create a more useful byproduct. Any element can be fused from H1 to ununtrium but the heavier the elements, the harder it is to fuse it. In the sun a very different sort of fusion can happen, H1+ H1 fusion this does not result in He2 though it in fact this results in one anti neutrino and one positron because the W- and W+ bosons cannot hold the nucleus together, strangely no gamma rays are produced in these reactions. Then you would wonder how get those bright plasmas if no He is produced, amazingly more than two elements can be fused in any one reaction, in the suns case it happens to be that sometimes H1+H1+H1+H1 reactions take place, this causes a release of 1 helium atom.

Fission.

In very heavy materials like radium uranium and plutonium there are a lot of neutrons and protons, meaning it is harder to keep the atom together, consequently implying that even the slightest force that acts on the atom could break the bond, making it into two or more lighter elements that are much more stable. In most fission reactions (for example uranium fission reactions) a free neutron in some way or the other is fired at the nucleus of the atom this in turn makes the atom very unstable and as I wrote before even the slightest disruption to the nucleus of a very heavy atom could break the bond and the neutron happens to have the grunt to tae on the job, at this point the atom can’t bare the stress any-more so it almost immediately splits into smaller elements (kind of like elemental suicide), this break also releases some neutrons, e.g.: In uranium fissile reactions U 235 (the number is how many neutrons and protons are in the nucleus, this also happens to be an isotope of uranium) gains one extra neutron making it U 236 this causes the core to become very unstable, having the original U 235 be an isotope, one of the few byproducts are 2 neutrons. (The rest are krypton, barium, gamma rays, heat and of course kinetic energy released from the core).

This will keep being updated; if you have any ideas, comments, or you would like to point out any mistakes feel free! P.S I desperately want comments even if they are good job or well done etc... 

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I apologise for any inconvenience, but I'm only 11 and at the moment I am  just getting used to the Powder Toy website, and how to use it, sadly I have not yet quite figured out how to repost saves implying that I need to make an all new save.

BTW if you can tell me how to repost saves it will be much appreciated!