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Everybody,
It was known that in many countries, the public exhibition of real objects and photos of transuranics (post-92 elements)are illegal. But why do they do so?
Another thing is, this rules can never be totally run, as Americium is inside the smoke detector, which basically every company has some. Also, natural Plutonium can be earned by collecting Beryl-Uranic alloys. The alpha decay between the Uranium and the Beryllium bombarded by the alpha decay of Uranium would eventually build up Plutonium.
This kind of Beryl-Uranic alloys are natural occuring in many Beryls and Pitchblendes (ores for Beryllium and Uranium).
Then, why and how is the rule made and put in force? And what's the use if it can't be effective? And why many countries don't have these rules?
I imagine countries make laws concerning the use of radioactive substances, because they are dangerous to public health and the environment and could also possibly be used to make weapons....?
Laws get made at all sorts of different levels, from the United Nations & International Court at The Hague, down to the rules of my local golf club.
The law is frequently and ass. And people break laws all the time.
Problem...? lol
But they are not harmful if they can be made to a mass that you can see it and if you wash hands after handling them.
you can't cure radiation sickness simply by washing your hands! lol
You can if it is Uranium 238 or some mild others.
what I mean is,
you can remove the uranium from your skin,
but the whole time it has been on there,
you will have been getting tissue damage from the radioactivity...
Ah, sorry for not telling you to wear metallic gloves 8)
From what i understood, Uranium isn't that radioactive. Radioactive yes, but as long as you don't put one of those "Fiesta-ware Orange" plates on your head for a year, I think you'll be all right. I think the problem lies more with the subsequent decays after U does its thing. I was always under the impression that the shorter half-life time isotopes, generally give off more gamma ray radiation. U238 has a half life on the order of 10^7 years or something. Beta and Alpha radiation, yes they aren't good for you, but they are far from the power of gamma rays. Heck, a piece of paper blocks alpha particles.
FYI - the orange glaze on the plates is orange because of U. They haven't been made since the 70's, and I'm not sure if they even made it outside of the US. Can still find them on ebay, and will make a gieger counter dance
There are a couple of pics of uranium glass in WebElements! Very pretty. See http://www.parkcity.ne.jp/~ken-toma/ for much more.
Thanks.
Another problem is uranium glass is now gradually replaced by copper glass. And the orange uranium dish should be replaced by the golden copper dish (with some blurring paint?), right?
I'm not sure how much uranium colored glass is still made in the states. The problem is almost always cost prohibitive because of hazards involved with the elemental colorants. For example, most red colored glass was colored so by either small amounts of gold or Cadmium. Cadmium is very toxic, gold very expensive. However, I can't remember exactly how we did it for lab, but we ended up using green Cr+3 glass something, then reducing the Cr to Cr+2 (like in Rubies) in a forming gas(10% H2, 90% N2) atmosphere at 500 C for 10 hours. There are always alternatives, its just harder and more expensive than just throwing some Cd in the glass.