Concepts
Radiometric Dating
Also Known As Radioactive Dating
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Dating rocks and minerals by the steady decay of radioactive isotopes they contain, each decay series a clock running at a known rate. Uranium-lead, potassium-argon and radiocarbon methods each cover a different span of time, and together they turned the geologic time scale from a relative ordering into a calendar with numbers, including the 4.5 billion year age of Earth itself.
Facts
Origin YearErnest Rutherford proposed the technique in 1906; Bertram Boltwood produced the first practical radiometric age determinations in 1907. Cross-Tradition Connections
Associated With
Radiometric ages are what give the geologic time scale its absolute dates.
In Discipline
Sources
1. Radiometric Dating (Wikipedia)
Wikimedia FoundationIntroduction (pioneers)Quote, Introduction (pioneers)
Radiometric dating of minerals and rocks was pioneered by Ernest Rutherford (1906) and Bertram Boltwood (1907).
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