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Americium

Anonymous Mon 18 Apr 04:07:30 2022 No.14405167 View Reply Original Report

Quoted By:

I was removing the 200 nanograms of Americium from a smoke detector for my cloud chamber and accidently lightly scratched and dented the button.
I know the tiny amount of americium is electroplated to the disc, but could this have scraped some off? Would it become dust in the air? Is it dangerous?

Anonymous

Anonymous Mon 18 Apr 2022 14:48:27 No.14406238 Report

Quoted By: >>14406477 >>14407001

are you for real? even if you'd powder the entire thing it's 200 NANOgrams of mostly a weak alpha emitter, bound in a stable oxide.
i wouldn't recommend it but googling suggests you can literally swallow such a platelet without any substantial harm done
if you were being literal, yes you could scrape some off, and yes that could form dust, but no it's probably not more radioactive than what, eating a banana? you're safe

Anonymous

Anonymous Mon 18 Apr 2022 16:08:20 No.14406477 Report

Quoted By: >>14407001 >>14407156

>>14406238
you are retarded. breathing in alpha emitters is not the same as your skin being exposed to alpha radiation. alphas are far more dangerous when they are inside your lungs.

Anonymous

Anonymous Mon 18 Apr 2022 20:00:09 No.14407001 Report

Quoted By: >>14407156

>>14406238
It was more like I made small marks on the back side of the button where my scissors pressed into it, and then a small dent on the front side. I didn't really make any scraping motions, but I am still worried.
>>14406477
This is what I'm worried about. I aired out the entire area, vacuumed everything, and wiped off every surface. I took 14 or so air samples in various parts of the room for my cloud chamber and saw nothing out of the ordinary, but I'm going to do it again.
The Amercium performed completely fine in the cloud chamber, so with the above I'm pretty sure none scraped off, but I want to put my fears to rest.

Anonymous

Anonymous Mon 18 Apr 2022 20:47:37 No.14407156 Report

Quoted By:

>>14406477
>>14407001
bruh
that small brush over does literally nothing in terms of dust that you can breathe in. and even if, your lungs actively push out stuff all the time. and even if if, this thing is so weakly radiating, you get more DNA damage by standing in the sun for 10 seconds than from the potential 10000 scraped atoms of weak alpha emitters. get a grip, you're absolutely fine and your worries are totally out of place.

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