this post was submitted on 26 Jun 2023
60 points (100.0% liked)

Ask Science

6 readers
1 users here now

Ask a science question, get a science answer.

founded 2 years ago
60
Why do we associate nuclear radiation with a green glow? (kbin.social)
submitted 2 years ago by VoxAdActa@kbin.social to c/askscience@kbin.social
32 comments fedilink hide all child comments
 

So I just saw the YouTube video someone posted that showed nuclear reactors starting up, and the first thing I noticed was that they all glowed a very bright, pretty blue. I'm probably an idiot, but I was honestly expecting green, because of many years of dramatized depictions in popular media.

These are probably dumb questions, but:

  1. Why is it blue? As in, what's actually glowing in there, and why do we see it that way?

and

  1. Why do all the movies and comic books and video games go with green instead? Where did that come from?
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[โ€“] lemonh3ad@kbin.social 20 points 2 years ago (1 children)

They used to have radioactive decoder rings and other toys that glowed green in the dark. They also used to paint all sorts of things with radioactive paint to glow in the dark like instrument panels.

[โ€“] Gamers_Mate@kbin.social 9 points 2 years ago

Interesting I just assumed they did that in cartoons like how you see a skeleton when someone gets electrocuted.