Question

Isotopes of an element have:
A) Identical chemical properties
B) Slightly different physical properties
C) Very different half life
D) All of the above

Answer 1

Hint:We know that isotopes of an atom of the same element are the one which contains same number of protons or we can say they have the same atomic number but different mass number, hence they will also have different number of neutrons in their nuclei as number of neutrons is equal to the difference between the mass number of the atom and the atomic number.


Complete solution:
As we know that isotopes have the same atomic number and different mass number so we can also say that they will have the same chemical properties as from many observations it has been identified that the atoms which have the same atomic number will show nearly identical chemical properties.
While on the other hand the physical properties of an atom are related to its mass number and we know that isotopes have different mass numbers but the isotope of the same element will have a slight difference in their physical properties.
Half-life is the time taken by half of the original concentration of the isotope to decay back to its stable form. Therefore, each of the isotopes have a different, characteristic half-life which is not dependent on any outside influence such as physical state, temperature and pressure. All of the above as we see that isotopes show all of the properties which are given in the options.

Hence, the correct option is (D).


Note: An example of isotope is Carbon $ - 12$ , Carbon $ - 13$ and Carbon $ - 14$ . Here the numbers assigned to carbon are denoting the mass number. We say that the half-life of the isotope elements is different because they have a smaller half-life than the original element i.e. the elements present in the periodic table. Isotopes are not present in the periodic table.