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becquerel

File:Radium_226_radiation_source_1.jpg · Wikimedia Commons · See Wikimedia Commons

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The becquerel (; symbol: Bq) is the unit of radioactivity in the International System of Units (SI). One becquerel is defined as an activity of one per second, on average, for aperiodic activity events referred to a radionuclide. For applications relating to human health this is a small quantity, and SI multiples of the unit are commonly used.

AI overview

A becquerel is the standard unit used to measure radioactivity, defined as one radioactive decay event occurring per second. It's a very small amount for practical purposes involving human health, so scientists typically use larger multiples of the unit instead.

AI-generated from the Wikipedia summary — may contain errors.

Key facts

Unit.name
becquerel
Unit.image
Radium 226 radiation source 1.jpg
Unit.caption
Radium-226 radiation source. Activity 3300 Bq (3.3 kBq)
Unit.standard
SI
Unit.quantity
activity
Unit.symbol
Bq
Unit.namedafter
Henri Becquerel
Unit.units1
rutherford
Unit.units2
curie
Unit.inunits2
Unit.units3
SI base unit
Unit.inunits3
s−1

via Wikipedia infobox

~4 min read

Encyclopedic overview

8 sections
Contents
  • Definition
  • Unit capitalization and prefixes
  • Examples
  • Relation to the curie
  • Relation to other radiation-related quantities
  • See also
  • References
  • External links

The becquerel (; symbol: Bq) is the unit of radioactivity in the International System of Units (SI). One becquerel is defined as an activity of one per second, on average, for aperiodic activity events referred to a radionuclide. For applications relating to human health this is a small quantity, and SI multiples of the unit are commonly used.

The becquerel is named after Henri Becquerel, who shared a Nobel Prize in Physics with Pierre and Marie Curie in 1903 for their work in discovering radioactivity.

Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “becquerel” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.

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