27 Feb : Radio carbon dating was made possible

You must have read or heard about archaeologists digging deep and coming across some 5,000 years old piece of wood, or a 2000 year old painting, or a mummy etc. Now how these archaeologists or scientists find the age of these ancient things ? It’s easy for them because of radio carbon dating.

It is a method for determining the age of an object containing organic material. by using the properties of a radioactive isotope of carbon – Carbon 14. 

Carbon 14 was discovered today in 1940 by Martin Kamen and Sam Ruben. It is a long-lived naturally occurring radioactive carbon isotope of mass 14, used in carbon dating and as a tracer in biochemistry.

There are three naturally occurring isotopes of carbon on Earth: 99% of the carbon is carbon-12, 1% is carbon-13, and carbon-14 occurs in trace amounts. This isotope of carbon which has carbon in trace amounts is used for determining the age of an object containing organic material.

#Hindi
विज्ञान में कई चीज़ें ऐसी हैं जिसका आम आदमी से सीधे-सीधे कोई लेना-देना नहीं होता है। लेकिन आम जनजीवन में इसका असर बहुत होता है। कुछ ऐसी ही चीज़ है Radiocarbon dating। 1940 में आज Martin Kamen और Sam Ruben ने carbon-14 की खोज की थी। इसके ज़रिये radiocarbon dating संभव हो पाई। Radiocarbon dating का इस्तेमाल किसी organic material की उम्र जानने के लिए किया जाता है।