• NathA
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    1 day ago

    Don’t we all have a teeny bit of uranium in our homes in smoke detectors? Or was that some urban myth I’m remembering?

    • Zagorath
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      1 day ago

      Not an urban myth, but a combination of slightly incorrect and very out of date. “Ionisation” smoke alarms typically contain Americium-241, which is radioactive just like uranium is (that’s the slightly incorrect).

      But ionisation smoke alarms are illegal to install in Queensland (probably other states too, I just didn’t check), and haven’t been recommended since at least 2006 (that’s the very out of date). Instead, these days, smoke alarms are typically photoelectric.