What is Carbon 14 Dating or Radiocarbon Dating
Carbon 14 Dating , also called as RadioCarbon Dating , method of age determination that depends upon the decay to nitrogen of Radio-carbon ( carbon-14 ) . Carbon 14 is continuously formed in nature with the interaction of neutrons with nitrogen -14 in the Earth's atmosphere ; the neutrons required for this reaction are produced by the cosmic rays that are interacting with the atmosphere.
Radiocarbon present in the molecules of atmospheric carbon dioxide enters the biological carbon cycle (q.v ) , it is absorbed by the air by green plants and then passed on to the animals through food chain. Radiocarbon decays slowly in a living organism and the amount lost is continuously replenished as long as the organism takes in air or food.Once the organism dies , however it stops to adsorb Carbon-14 , so that the mount of Radiocarbon i its tissue steadily decreases.
Carbon 14 has a half life of 5730 +- ( plus or minus ) 40 years - ie , half the amount of radio isotope present at any given time will undergo spontaneous disintegration during the succeeding 5730 years . Because Carbon 14 decays at this constant rate , the estimate of the date at which an organism dies can be made by measuring the amount of its residual radiocarbon.
The carbon- 14 method was developed by the U.S. physicist Willard F. Libby about 1946.
It has proven to be a versatile technique of dating fossils and archeological specimens from 500 to 50,000 years old. The method is widely used by the Pleistocene geologists, anthropologists, archeologists and investigators in related filed.
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