you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] 44 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago) (5 children)

Polonium-210 produces alpha radiation, which can't penetrate the skin. It will kill you with cancer if even one microgram of the stuff gets in your body, but otherwise it's relatively harmless. [Edit 1: That being said, a small cereal toy like that is, uhh, ironic. Edit 2: Oh and apparently it dissolves in water :DDD]

Also with a half life of 138 days it's hardly "one of the most radioactive substances on Earth".

  • source
  • hideshow 5 child comments
  • [–] 10 points 9 months ago (2 children)

    Also with a half life of 138 days it's hardly "one of the most radioactive substances on Earth".

    A shorter half life generally means it puts out more radiation per hour.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 2 child comments
  • [–] 3 points 9 months ago (1 child)

    Yes, and 138 days is far from the shortest. Take Radon-220 for example. It can be found in nature in trace amounts, while having a half life of only 55.6 seconds, while Radon-222 has the longest half-life of all Radon isotopes at 3.8 days.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 1 child comment