Radiation Protection Glossary
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The beta particle has the form of a high speed negatively charged
electron (or a positively charged electron in the case of the
positron). In beta decay (electron emission) a
neutron in the
nucleus is converted to a
proton with the release of a high speed electron and an
antineutrino. In the example C-14 decays to N-14. Note the
atomic number has increased by one whilst the
mass number at 14 is unchanged. The beta particle is more penetrating than
alpha particles but still much less so than
gamma rays or
x-rays. For every beta emitter there is a unique energy spectrum characterised by average and maximum beta energy. For Tritium (H-3) this is around 18.5 KeV, for C-14 its 156 KeV and for P-32 it’s about 1.7 MeV.
