Analyzing Ancient Cave Paintings with Radiocarbon Dating · AI Generator #GEN-203AA13E
Physics · modern-physics
Problem
Archaeologists discover cave paintings in France and want to determine their age using radiocarbon dating. They extract a small sample of charcoal from the pigment, which contains 2.4×1012 carbon atoms. In their laboratory, they measure the radioactive decay rate and find that 8.2 carbon-14 nuclei decay per minute.
Given that living organisms maintain a ratio of one carbon-14 atom per 1.3×1012 carbon atoms, and carbon-14 has a half-life of 5730 years, determine the age of the cave paintings.