Historical Geology

Homework 1 Name _______________________________

Read 39.PDF Radiometric Dating and answer the following questions.

1. Which isotopes listed in Table 1 (p.3) are useful in dating shorter intervals of time, such as the past 100,000 years, with a greater accuracy.

2. Rocks that contain small amounts of daughter atoms cannot be used for radiometric dating.

a. true b. false

3. One of the best ways of showing that an age-date is correct is to confirm it with one or more different dating methods.

a. true b. false

4. What does the slope of the line represent on a rubidium-strontium three-isotope plot (fig. 4)?

5. In what situations is the samarium-neodymium dating method preferred?

6. How does the author explain the practically identical ages of most of the meteorites?

7. What is the significance of the lack of radionuclides with a half-live less than one billion years?

8. How is carbon-14 produced?

9. The study of tree rings and the ages they give is called _______________________________.

10. List at least 4 non-radiometric dating methods that yield an absolute age.