Question

How is radiation commonly used in technology? (including which type of radiation and why that particular one is best suited)

Answer 1

Some common uses of radiation in technology.

X-ray to obtain images of internal body organs. Best adapted for this purpose for giving different types of image according to tissue density, allowing their differentiation. It is used with direct print on plates or connected to computers to produce computerized axial tomography (CAT) or computed tomography (CT) imaging.

X-rays are used too in airport for luggage screening, due to clear imagine and no harm to inside materials.

As therapy for some diseases like cancer, because it affects quicker and stronger these quickly reproducing cells, thereby eliminating them.

Analogously they are used to examine materials to detect defects affecting the structural resistance of a given material. Adequate for this purpose because of high resolution images of defects, relatively easy handling of equipment to handle this radiation.

Radionucleides which produce radiation when decomposing, are used to study flow of substances through structures, for example, a medicine in body, or water in a channel. Suited for this purpose because the produced radiation is easy to detect, non harming for human beings due to its low energy and short lived, not leaving radioactive products in the long term.

They are used too for time dating, for example, the half-life (time in which, half the initial amount decomposes) of the isotope C-14 is adequate for establishing time of living beings or objects created by human cultures.

The ultraviolet radiation is used for disinfecting food, water, because bacteries are sensitive to this kind of radiation. Adequate because of low cost and not residues leaving.

Nuclear radiation coming from fission in nuclear reactors are used to produce electricity. Adequate to this purpose, because of the large amount of released energy in relation to its mass.

And, unfortunately, military applications of radiation in the form of nuclear explosives.