| A | B |
|---|
| absolute age | the numeric age of something |
| rates of erosion | a practical way of determining the age of things that are 10-20,000 years old |
| rate of deposition | a method of determining absolute age that is not very accurate because of flooding and change. |
| varve | yearly sedimentary deposits at the bottom of lakes |
| radioactive isotope | atoms that emit particles and energy at a constant rate |
| radiometric dating | the process of using radioactive decay to measure absolute age |
| parent isotope | the original radioactive isotope |
| daughter isotope | the newly formed isotope from radioactive decay |
| half life | the time it takes for a given amount of parent isotope to decay into a daughter isotope |
| carbon-14 dating | using the amounts of carbon isotopes to determin relative ages |
| isotopes | atoms with different numbers of neutrons |
| radioactive decay | the breakdown of isotopes from the emission of particles |
