Many paleontologists use the C-14 method to determine the age of fossils. This method is one of the most accurate.
Fossils are the remains or traces of life from living things in the past. There are lots of fossils of living things in ancient times that have been identified.
After finding the fossil, then the paleontologists will find out the age of the fossil.
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The C-14 Method as a Method of Determining the Age of Fossils
The discovery of fossils is basically useful for research material. Therefore, paleontologists will look for information in such a way about the fossils they find.
The age of the fossil is very important to know. Since the late 1940s, paleontologists have been looking for the age of a fossil using the C-14 method.
Launching from Future Learn, the C-14 method is a radiometric dating method using the decay rate of radioactive isotopes to determine the date of an object.
Every radioactive isotope has a half-life which is a constant rate of decay. By knowing the decay rate of these isotopes, scientists can calculate the age of a fossil.
Carbon 14 or C-14 is one of the active elements in the isotope. In Earth’s atmosphere, there are only about one in a trillion carbon atoms which is C-14 most of which comes from the Cosmic Ray Action of Nitrogen (N-14).
Once C-14 is formed, it will decompose back into nitrogen. If you already know the amount of C-14 in living tissue, then you can measure the amount of C-14 in dead plants or animals.
After that, compare the sizes to assess how long they have been dead. Scientists can determine the age of this fossil by knowing the decay rate of C-14, which represents a half-life of 5,370 years.
Later, it will look at the estimated radiocarbon age of an ancient fossil sample.
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Determining the Age of Older Fossils and Inanimate Objects
Knowing the amount of C-14 from dead tissue is certainly not easy. Moreover, the production of C-14 in the atmosphere is not always constant.
Therefore, scientists use the half-life of carbon-14 which is 5,370 years as an ideal benchmark, for those who want to study the last 50,000 years of Earth’s history.
“Basically there is an interesting part of human history to know the development of civilization and the origin of agriculture through this radiocarbon,” said Higham.
When objects are older, they lose about 99% of their carbon-14. In addition, the radiocarbon dating method can only be performed on objects that have ever lived.
Therefore, scientists no longer use the C-14 method to detect the age of older fossils.
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They see more radioactive isotopes of other elements in the environment. The world’s oldest objects use the uranium-thorium-lead dating method to determine their age.
Of course, scientists also use the uranium-thorium-lead method to determine the age of fossils to measure the age of inanimate objects, such as rocks and other objects. (R10/HR-Online)
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