Little help?

[baloonworld]

I'm trying to dumb downsimplify my reserch (Recoil decay tagging of Cs-112) for presenting to the general public (in this case, a royal bank of scotland manager), and I'm kind of defeated, because I don't know how ignorant the general public is about nuclear structure (My supervisor is even worse).

at preset my introduction reads:

It is presently of considerable interest in nuclear physics to study very exotic nuclei which lie very far from the valley of stability. These nuclei are difficult to produce and study experimentally, but recent developments in detectors has made this study possible.

Do I need to add:

exotic= containing may more or fewer neutrons than is normal for the element; unstable.
vally of stablitiy = the general trend for the relative number of neutrons and protons in a stable element.
unstable = radioactive.

Would it be better to drop "vally of stablitiy" in favor of somthig more literal ad descriptive?

Do you know what a isotope is?

Comments

[doribore.livejournal.com]

Having never studied physics, I can say that I know what an isotope is, mostly because the word is used so much in referring to half lifes and atomic bombs. So that should be ok.

Valley of stability *might* work, but it could also use a little clarification as to what exactly it is.

exotic should be ok, as should unstable, which is a word that speaks for itself. If your boss doesn't understand unstable, he needs help.

Course, I could say that for most bosses.... but it's easily looked up in a dictionary, unlike the others. ;-)