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Unstable vs Radioactive - What's the difference?

unstable | radioactive |

As adjectives the difference between unstable and radioactive

is that unstable is having a strong tendency to change while radioactive is exhibiting radioactivity.

unstable

English

Adjective

(en adjective)
  • Having a strong tendency to change.
  • * {{quote-magazine, date=2013-08-03, volume=408, issue=8847, magazine=(The Economist)
    • , title= Yesterday’s fuel , passage=The dawn of the oil age was fairly recent. Although the stuff was used to waterproof boats in the Middle East 6,000 years ago, extracting it in earnest began only in 1859 after an oil strike in Pennsylvania.
  • Fluctuating; not constant.
  • Fickle.
  • Unpredictable.
  • (chemistry) Readily decomposable.
  • (physics) Radioactive, especially with a short half-life.

    • Synonyms

    * instable (rare) * (not held or fixed securely and likely to fall over) precarious, rickety, shaky, tottering, unsafe, unsteady, wobbly

    Antonyms

    * stable

    Related terms

    * instability * unstability (rare)

    Anagrams

    *

    radioactive

    English

    (wikipedia radioactive)

    Adjective

    (-)
  • Exhibiting radioactivity.

    • Derived terms

    * nonradioactive * radioactively