1.

Absolute Dating
2.
3. Unlike relative dating, absolute dating provides specific dates,
expressed in years before present, for specific rock units. It tells
you, fairly precisely, when an event took place. The most
common method is radiometric dating.
4.
5. Radiometric dating is a way of calculating the age of rocks
using the natural rates of decay of radioactive elements present
in trace amounts in some minerals. By using radiometric dating
together with relative dating, numerical dates can be placed on
some of the events in the relative time scale. In other words,
relative dating provides the framework and identifies the events,
and absolute dating provides the scale (age, in years) that
constrains the events.
6.
7. Most of the 92 naturally occurring elements are stable, but
some are radioactive and spontaneously decay to other, more
stable forms. In so doing, they release energy in the form of
heat.
8.
9. Atoms have protons, neutrons and electrons. In an atom, the
number of protons defines the element’s atomic number, and
determines many of its properties. But not all atoms of an
element have the same number of neutrons, and these
variations of an element are called isotopes. Many isotopes
are stable (they never change), and have interesting and useful
properties (we’ll come to them later). It is, however, the
unstable isotopes that are measured to determine the age of
rocks, because they ‘decay.’
10.

11.
12.
13. Radioactive decay is the process by which an unstable
atomic nucleus is spontaneously transformed into a nucleus of
another element. This can take place by loss of a proton,
 neutron or electron, or by gaining an electron. Depending on
the element, there can be many decay stages before a stable
isotope eventually results.
14.
15. The rate of decay is measured in half-lives, because
radioactive decay is not linear, but rather geometric. The half-
life of a given isotope is the time it takes for half of the original,
unstable ‘parent’ element to decay to atoms of the new,
‘daughter’ element.
16.

17.
18.
19. The half-life of each isotope is constant and can be
precisely measured. Half-lives range from less than a second to
50 billion years.
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21.
22.
23. The age of a rock is determined by extracting from it
samples of a mineral that contains the radioactive element of
interest. The ratio of parent to daughter products is then
measured in a mass spectrometer, a device that measures the
atomic weights of isotopes. Using the parent-daughter ratio and
the known half-life of the isotope in question, the age of the
rock can then be determined.
24.
25. The reason why this works is because the chemical
properties of the parent atoms allow them to enter into the
crystal lattice of certain minerals—usually as a trace amount
that substitutes chemically for one of the main elements in that
mineral. The chemical properties of the daughter product will
not be the same as those of the parent, and so at the starting
point, when the crystal forms, there will be no daughter product
in the crystal lattice. Any daughter product in the crystal at a
later time had to have come from radioactive decay. Remember
 that the atoms in any mineral are trapped inside a crystal lattice
and cannot escape, even if they are transformed into a different
element. Over time, the amount of parent atoms declines, and
the amount of daughter product increases—and all are trapped
inside the crystal lattice. It is the ratio between parent and
daughter product trapped in a crystal that allows us to date the
crystal’s formation. The time being measured is the time of
crystallization of the mineral containing the atoms, not the time
of formation of the radioactive atoms or their daughter products.
26.