How do you write the nuclear equation of the 'annihilation of beta particles to form radiation'?

1 Answer
Truong-Son N.
Jul 22, 2018

Annihilation just means the destruction of particles that have nonrelativistic mass. This occurs when a particle and antiparticle collide. Likely the example you are looking for is the annihilation of an electron (#""_(-1)^(0) e#) by a positron (#""_(+1)^(0) e#):

#""_(-1)^(0) e + ""_(+1)^(0) e -> 2""_(0)^(0) gamma#

This forms 2 gamma ray photons, #""_(0)^(0) gamma#. Here we observe

  • conservation of charge
  • conservation of particles

The net charge remains #0#, and the net number of particles remains #2#. The photons have no nonrelativistic mass.

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