Caesium is a type of metal that can be radioactive or nonradioactive, in other words it can be stable or unstable. Caesium 137 is an isotope of Caesium, it is radioactive, or unstable. It is a very familiar and common radioactive isotope, for example it is more environmentally compelling or important than another isotope of Caesium like Caesium 134. Caesium 137 along with several other radioactive isotopes were discovered in the 1930’s by Glenn T. Seaborg. Although Caesium was first discovered as non radioactive in water in Germany by two germans named Gustav Kirchhoff and Robert Bunsen (Cesium, Radiation Protection). Before going into the science behind Caesium 137 I will explain what an isotope and a radioisotope is. All elements naturally occur as isotopes, they are basically atoms with a different amount of neutrons. For example, Caesium 137 and Caesium 136 are both isotopes of the element Caesium. We can tell these isotopes apart by naming them by their total mass numbers. The total mass numbers are calculated by adding the number of protons with the amount of neutrons. Each isotope has a different mass number, Caesium 137 has 82 neutrons and 55 protons, therefore it is labelled Caesium 137, as 82 added by 55 equals 137. The mass numbers of isotopes also indicate the atomic weight of the isotopes, Caesium 137 is 137 atomic mass units or 137 u. The atomic mass of the elements are decided by the mass number of their average isotope. Regular Isotopes always maintain the same amount of neutrons and protons, these are called stable. There are also isotopes whose nuclei fall apart, these are radioisotopes, like Caesium 137. These radioisotopes cause radiation, this radiation can be intensely dangerous. The radiation is caused by the discharge of waves from atoms. These radioisotopes can be absolutely no good, but can also be useful in life in good ways such as treating harmful diseases like cancer, just like Caesium 137.

Caesium 137 comes from the fission between uranium and plutonium. Fission, or nuclear fission, is when a nucleus in an atom splits and creates an unplanned reaction which releases energy, an example of when this is used is when creating nuclear weapons of mass destruction. Caesium 137 is not the only isotope that is created by the splitting of Uranium and Plutonium, but is a well known one. The properties of Caesium 137 are that it is a soft, silvery white metal, it is also actually one of the three single metals that are in liquid form when near room temperature, which is around 26.6 degrees celsius. The half-life of Caesium 137 is approximately 30 years, a radioactive half life is basically how long it takes for a half of as radioactive nuclei to go through radioactive decay (Radioactive Half Life, Hyperphysics). Radioactive decay is when the nucleus in an unstable or radioactive atom loses its energy.
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Caesium 137 is used mainly for industry, some examples are moisture density gauges used for construction, leveling gauges used to check and discover the liquid flow in pipelines, thickness gauges used for finding out the thickness in sheet metal (Cesium, Radiation Protection). Gauges are things used in the construction industry that show the contents in something. Apart from the industry, Caesium 137 is used in limited quantities of radiation detection equipment, mainly for treating cancer (Radiation Brief: Caesium 137, CDC).

One main problem or global issues in the world is cancer, as it strikes many women and men in all different parts of the earth. It can be argued that cancer is the worst disease on our earth today. Caesium helps treat cancer as there is a so called stronger treatment of fast developing types of cancer called Cesium Cancer Protocol (Ph therapy, Cancer Tutor). This treatment can be used on cancer patients with any stage of cancer. The treatment works in the following way, the natural body of a human being has to be in an assured pH range, if your body is in the wrong or is in a bad pH range the consequence is that you will simply die. The pH range that our body is in can be affected by what foods and liquids we consume on a daily basis. The pH range is from the number 0 to 14, if your body is in a range lower than number 7 then that is considered an deoxygenated or low oxygen state while above 7 represents an oxygenated or basically a better state (Cancer, Cesium Chloride, High PH Therapy). A variety of cancers can lower your pH range and Caesium is used to raise the pH range or make it more oxygenated. Some examples of patients who have used caesium to improve the pH range are patients who suffer from breast cancer, lung cancer, prostate cancer, colon cancer, and many more. So the overall benefits of Caesium 137 is that it can help treat a range of different types of cancer by raising the pH levels of patients but some of the disadvantages of using Caesium to treat cancer are the chances that a patient can experience swelling in already dying cancer cells or tumours which can be extremely dangerous to vital organs but experts nowadays are more than able to keep these risks at a safe level (pH Therapy, Cancer Tutors).

Although Caesium 137 can help be a live safer for many people, it also has its downsides, in this case on the environment. Caesium 137 can be released into the environment through nuclear weapons, as Caesium is in and helps create nuclear weapons. People may think the last nuclear weapons were dropped in Japan during World War Two by the Americans and the the radioactivity would have decayed by now but due to nuclear testing in the 1960’s and the nuclear power plant accident in Chernobyl, Ukraine a lot of Caesium 137 was released into the earth’s environment (Cesium, Radiation Protection). That is not an understatement, the caesium actually spread around most of the whole world that we live in today, this would have radiated not only plants and animals but also people everywhere, causing not an only environmental problem but also a social problem. If you're wondering why it is such a problem that the nature and people get
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in contact with Caesium 137, well its quite simply really, for people and animals it can of course increase the risk of cancer and other diseases (Radioisotope Brief: Caesium 137, CDC). Concerning the nature the radioactive decay can be hard to get rid of and it can stay around for long periods of time due to its half life of 30 years.

In conclusion I think Caesium 137 is an excellent use of treating cancer as it has a good scientific reputation as in its a good form of treatment compared to other less effective cancer treatments. Although I think it’s negatives outweigh its positives in the sense that Global Radiation is a more dangerous and risky problem for our earth in the long term than some forms of cancer. With this I mean that one treatment of cancer is less important than the possibility that our whole world can be radiated and infected by cancer due to nuclear testing or accidents, as there are other methods to treating cancer.