Principles of Radiocarbon (14C) Dating

1. This technique allows the construction of year-by-year annual chronologies which can be temporally fixed (linked to the present day) or floating, e.g. dendrochronology (11, 6)
4. Who won the Nobel prize for developing this technique in the 1940s? (7, 5)
5. 14C forms in the upper atmosphere when 14N is bombarded by... (6, 4)
7. The time taken for half the atoms of a radioactive sample to decay (4, 4)
8. Calculates an age in years for geologic materials by measuring the presence of a short-life radioactive element, e.g. 14C. A type of this dating method is radiocarbon (14C) dating. (11, 6)
9. A type of dating: deciding whether one event predates or postdates another event (8, 6)

2. A type of dating: assigning a numerical age to an event (8, 6)
3. A method of measurement: an accelerated mass spectrometer is used to count the number of 14C atoms present, instead relying on emission of their daughter products. Can process smaller samples, e.g. insect remains, individual seeds, etc. (3, 6)
6. The exponential rate at which radioactive decay occurs as displayed on a graph (5, 5)
10. The number of protons and neutrons in the nucleus of a carbon atom (4, 6)

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