13

Clues to Earths Past

3
section

Absolute Ages of Rocks

What Youll Learn

how absolute age
differs from relative age
how the half-lives of
isotopes are used to tell
a rocks age

Highlight As you read this

section, highlight each of the
vocabulary terms and their
definitions.

C Explain Use quarter

sheets of notebook paper to

explain absolute age, radioactive
decay, half-life, and radiometric
dating.

198

Absolute
Age

Radioactive
Decay

Half-life

Radiometric
Dating

Clues to Earths Past

Before You Read

How old are you? How do you know what your exact age
is? On the lines below, tell different ways you could verify
your exact age.

Read to Learn
Absolute Ages
After you sort through your stack of magazines looking
for that article about the car you saw, you decide that you
need to get your magazines back into a neat pile. By now,
they are all in a jumble. They are no longer in order
according to their relative age. How can you stack them so
the oldest are on the bottom and the newest are on the top?
Luckily, all the magazines have dates on their covers. The
dates make your job easy. By using the dates as your guide,
you can put the magazines back in order easily.

What is absolute age?

Rocks dont have dates stamped on them. Or do they?
Absolute age is the age, in years, of a rock or other object.
Scientists who study rocks, or geologists, are able to figure
out the absolute age of rocks. Geologists use the properties
of atoms in rock material to determine absolute age.
Knowing the absolute age of rocks leads to a better
understanding of events in Earths history.

Copyright Glencoe/McGraw-Hill, a division of The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc.

chapter

Radioactive Decay
Each atom has a dense center called the nucleus, which is
surrounded by particles with a negative charge called
electrons. Inside the nucleus are protons, which have a
positive charge, and neutrons, which have no electric charge.
The number of protons determines the identity of the
element. The number of neutrons determines the form of
the element, or isotope. For example, every atom with just
one proton is a hydrogen atom. Hydrogen atoms can have
no neutrons, one neutron, or two neutrons. This means that
there are three isotopes of hydrogen. Some isotopes break
down into other isotopes, giving off a lot of energy.
Radioactive decay is the process in which the nucleus of an
atom breaks down.
1.

What are alpha and beta decay?

process in which the

nucleus of an atom breaks
down called?

In some isotopes, a neutron breaks down into a proton

and an electron. This type of radioactive decay is called beta
decay, because the electron leaves as a beta particle. The
nucleus loses a neutron but gains a proton. Other isotopes
give off two protons and two neutrons in the form of an
alpha particle. This is called alpha decay. Alpha and beta
decay are shown in the figure below.
Copyright Glencoe/McGraw-Hill, a division of The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc.

Identify What is the

Beta decay
Unstable parent
isotope

Daughter
product
Neutron

Proton
Beta particle
(electron)

Alpha decay
Unstable parent
isotope

Daughter
product

Picture This
Alpha
particle
Neutron
Proton

2.

Determine the beta

particle that is given off
during beta decay and the
alpha particle given off
during alpha decay.
Reading Essentials

199

What is a half-life?
Explain What has to
happen to the parent
isotope before the
daughter product
can form?

In radioactive decay, the parent isotope breaks down. The

daughter product is formed. Each parent isotope decays to
its daughter product at a certain rate. Based on its decay
rate, it takes a certain period of time for one half of the
parent isotope to decay to its daughter product. The half-life
of an isotope is the time it takes for half of the atoms in the
isotope to decay.
The figure below shows how during each half-life, one
half of the parent material decays to the daughter product.
For example, the half life of carbon-14 is 5,730 years. So, it
will take 5,730 years for half of the carbon-14 atoms to
change into nitrogen-14 atoms. You might think that in
another 5,730 years, all the remaining carbon-14 atoms will
decay into nitrogen-14 atoms. But they dont. Only half the
remaining atoms will decay during the next 5,730 years. So,
after two half-lives, one fourth of the original carbon-14
atoms will remain. After many half-lives, such a small
amount of isotope remains that it is not measurable.

1
2

3
4

7
8

15
16

1
2

1
4

Picture This
4.

Determine the fraction

that shows what remains of
the parent material after 4
half-lives. Write the fraction
below.
Parent
material

1 halflife

2 halflives

3 halflives

4 halflives

Radiometric Ages
Decay of radioactive isotopes is like a clock keeping track
of time that has passed since rocks have formed. As time
passes, the amount of parent isotope in a rock decreases and
the amount of daughter product increases. Scientists can use
this information to figure out the absolute age of the rock.
Radiometric dating is the process used to calculate the
absolute age of rock by measuring the ratio of parent
isotope to daughter product in a mineral and knowing the
half-life of the parent.

200

Clues to Earths Past

Copyright Glencoe/McGraw-Hill, a division of The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc.

3.

What does radiocarbon dating show?

Carbon-14 is useful for dating bones, wood, and charcoal
up to 75,000 years old. Living organisms take in carbon
from the environment to build their bodies. Most of the
carbon is carbon-12, but some is carbon-14. The ratio of
these two isotopes in the environment is always the same.
After the organism dies, the carbon-14 slowly decays.
Scientists can compare the isotope ratio in the sample to the
isotope ratio in the environment. Once scientists know the
amount of carbon-14 in a sample, they can determine the
age of bones, wood, or charcoal.

Can radiometric dating be used on all rocks?

Aside from carbon-14 dating, rocks that can be
radiometrically dated are usually igneous and metamorphic
rocks. Most sedimentary rocks cant be dated this way. Why?
Many sedimentary rocks are made up of particles that
eroded from older rocks. Dating these pieces only gives the
age of the original rocks they came from.

5.

Explain Why doesnt

radiometric dating work on
sedimentary rock?

Copyright Glencoe/McGraw-Hill, a division of The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc.

What are the oldest known rocks?

Radiometric dating has been used to date the oldest rocks
on Earth. These rocks are about 3.96 billion years old.
Scientists estimate Earth is about 4.5 billion years old. Rocks
older than 3.96 billion years probably were eroded or
changed by heat and pressure.

Uniformitarianism
Before radiometric dating was used, many people thought
Earth was only a few thousand years old. But in the 1700s,
Scottish scientist James Hutton estimated the Earth to be
much older. He used the principle of uniformitarianism.
Uniformitarianism states that Earth processes occurring
today are similar to those that occurred in the past.
Hutton observed that the processes that changed the
landscape around him were slow. He inferred that they were
just as slow all through Earths history. Hutton hypothesized
that it took much longer than a few thousand years to form
rock layers and erode mountains.
Today, scientists agree that Earth has been shaped by two
types of change. There are slow, everyday processes that take
place over millions of years. There are also sudden, violent
events such as the collision of a comet that might have
caused the dinosaurs to become extinct.

6.

Describe What are the

two types of change that
have changed Earth?

Reading Essentials

201

After You Read

Mini Glossary
absolute age: age, in years, of a rock or other object
half-life: time it takes for half of the atoms in an isotope to
decay
radioactive decay: process in which the nucleus of an atom
breaks down

radiometric dating: process used to calculate the absolute

age of rock by measuring the ratio of parent isotope to
daughter product in a mineral and knowing the half-life
of the parent
uniformitarianism: principle stating that Earth processes
occurring today are similar to those that occurred in the
past

1. Review the terms and their definitions in the Mini Glossary. Then explain the difference
between absolute age and relative age.

2. Fill in the half-life chart to show the decay of carbon-14 over time.
Half-Life of Carbon-14

100

Years
Passed
0

12.5
6.25
3.125

3. In this section you highlighted vocabulary terms. Was this strategy helpful? Explain why
or why not.

End of
Section

202

Clues to Earths Past

Visit earth.msscience.com to access your textbook, interactive

games, and projects to help you learn more about the absolute
ages of rocks.

Copyright Glencoe/McGraw-Hill, a division of The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc.

Percent
Carbon-14