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The Radiation You Can't Escape

Part of Background Radiation · GCSE GCSE Physics revision

This introduction covers The Radiation You Can't Escape within Background Radiation for GCSE Physics. Revise Background Radiation in Extra Topics for GCSE Physics with 13 exam-style questions and 12 flashcards. Use this page as part of a wider topic revision path rather than treating it as an isolated fact. It is section 1 of 12 in this topic. Use this introduction to connect the idea to the wider topic before moving on to questions and flashcards.

Topic position

Section 1 of 12

Practice

13 questions

Recall

12 flashcards

⚛️ The Radiation You Can't Escape

Right now, as you read this, you are being bombarded with radiation. Cosmic rays from distant exploding stars are passing through you. Radon gas, seeping up from uranium-bearing rocks beneath your feet, is dissolving into your lungs. Potassium-40 in your own bones is spontaneously decaying. Your stone walls, your food and drink, even the air around you — all faintly radioactive.

This is background radiation — the unavoidable, low-level radiation that exists everywhere on Earth. We have evolved with it over billions of years, and at normal background levels it presents a very small risk to health. But it is always there, and physicists must account for it whenever they make any measurement of radioactivity.

In the UK, the average person receives about 2.7 millisieverts (mSv) of radiation dose per year from background sources. This varies enormously depending on where you live — people in Cornwall (which sits on granite rock) receive about twice the UK average because granite is rich in uranium and thorium, which produce radon gas.

Keep building this topic

Read this section alongside the surrounding pages in Background Radiation. That gives you the full topic sequence instead of a single isolated revision point.

Sources of Background RadiationMeasuring Background Radiation and Correcting for ItWhy Radon is the Biggest Risk

Practice Questions for Background Radiation

What is background radiation?

  • A. Radiation produced only by nuclear power stations
  • B. Low-level ionising radiation that is always present in the environment from natural and artificial sources
  • C. Radiation that only occurs during nuclear accidents
  • D. Radiation emitted only by medical equipment
1 markfoundation

Describe two natural sources and one artificial source of background radiation.

2 marksstandard

Quick Recall Flashcards

What are cosmic rays?
Radiation from space (from exploding stars) that contributes ~10% of background radiation
What is background radiation?
Low-level radiation that is always present in the environment from natural and artificial sources

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Sources of Background Radiation