There are several isotopes of the element nitrogen.
Compare two different isotopes of nitrogen, such as Nitrogen-14 and Nitrogen-15.
A student measures the count rate of a sample of a radioactive nitrogen isotope in a laboratory. Describe the procedure they should follow to correct their raw measurements for background radiation.
The student records the corrected count rate of the sample every 12 minutes. The data is shown in the table below:
Time (minutes)Corrected count rate (counts per minute)01921213624963668484860347224\begin{array}{|c|c|} \hline \text{Time (minutes)} & \text{Corrected count rate (counts per minute)} \\ \hline 0 & 192 \\ \hline 12 & 136 \\ \hline 24 & 96 \\ \hline 36 & 68 \\ \hline 48 & 48 \\ \hline 60 & 34 \\ \hline 72 & 24 \\ \hline \end{array}Time (minutes)0122436486072Corrected count rate (counts per minute)1921369668483424Use the data in the table to estimate the half-life of this nitrogen isotope. Show your method clearly.
