What is a picocurie?
A picocurie is a unit of measure for radiation. A curie (named after French physicist Marie Curie) is a way of measuring radioactive decay or disintegration, and it equals 3.7 x 1010 disintegrations per second. “Pico” means “trillionth,” so a picocurie is a trillionth of a curie, or one-trillionth of 37 billion disintegrations per second. To put this in perspective, a house having 4 picocuries of radon per liter of air (4 pCi/l) has about 8 or 9 atoms of radon decaying every minute in every liter of air inside the house. A 1,000 square foot house with 4 pCi/l of radon has nearly 2 million atoms decaying in it every minute.
A picocurie is a unit of measure for radiation. A curie (named after French physicist Marie Curie) is a way of measuring radioactive decay or disintegration, and it equals 3.7 x 1010 disintegrations per second. “Pico” means “trillionth,” so a picocurie is a trillionth of a curie, or one-trillionth of 37 billion disintegrations per second. To put this in perspective, a house having 4 picocuries of radon per liter of air (4 pCi/l) has about 8 or 9 atoms of radon decaying every minute in every liter of air inside the house. A 1,000 square foot house with 4 pCi/l of radon has nearly 2 million atoms decaying in it every minute. 4. Is radon really a health risk? I’ve heard it is a scam! Yes, radon is a Class A carcinogen, which means it is known to cause cancer in humans. It is the second leading cause of lung cancer after smoking, and results in approximately 21,000 lung cancer deaths in the United States each year. Not everyone who breathes radon will develop lung cancer.
Radioactivity is commonly measured in picocuries (pCi). This unit of measure is named for the French physicist Madam Marie Curie, who was a pioneer in the research of radioactive elements and their decay. One pCi is equal to the decay of about two radioactive atoms per minute. Because the level of radioactivity is directly related to the number and type of radioactive atoms present, radon and all other radioactive elements are measured in pCi. For instance, a house having 4 pCi of radon per liter of air has about 8 or 9 atoms of radon decaying every minute in every liter of air inside the house. A 1,000 square foot house with 4 pCi/L of radon has nearly 2 million radon atoms decaying in it every minute.
