chemistry homework

[musemfire]

Help me... I'm in 2nd year of the High School... i need help with this +REP
I've used Google translator in it.. because i'm brazilian so it was in portuguese

1)When an atom of the isotope 228 thorium releases an alpha particle becomes a radio atom, according to the equation:
Th z=228 and a=x ~> Ra z=y a=88
Detemine x and y:

Help me :s

[pamst3r0]

z=228 and a=x ~> Ra z=y a=88
Detemine x and y (Finding y)

It says z = 228 then it goes to say z=y meaning y = 228

z=228 and a=x ~> Ra z=y a=88

Then it says a = x then it says that a = 88 meaning x = 88

__________________________________________________ _______

and the question is asking determine x and y ... so the final result would be like (88, 228)

I don't see anything related to chemistry in this question lol. Maybe I did it wrong... but I'm reading your question as it is lol.

[PotatoPig]

@pamst3ro You know one of the rules is to not ask for rep, right?

[pamst3r0]

then thanks for telling me.

btw did I do his question right?

[PotatoPig]

pamst3r0 No problem, I just don't want you to break the rules without knowing it :P

And I have no idea, I was always terrible at this stuff. :P

[trix]

musemfire This is the right answer :D

x=90

y=224

:D

---------- Post added at 05:16 PM ---------- Previous post was at 05:14 PM ----------

Because the atomic number of Th is 90 [this is x] (and it's mass number is 228) then when it emits an alpha particle it will lose two protons and two neutrons so its atomic number will decrease to 88 and its mass number will decrease to 224 [this is y][COLOR="Silver"]

[bamag]

^ lol ninjaed
An alpha particle is basically the nucleus of a helium atom which is 2 protons and 2 neutrons.
When Thorium-228 emits an alpha particle, it becomes Radium-224 (loses 2 protons and 2 neutrons which is total mass 4 so 228-4).
Since the problem says that there's 88 protons in the product, there must be 2 more protons before the alpha decay occur.
Therefore Thorium-228 has 90 protons.
x=90 y=224 (assuming I understood the problem correctly)