I want to fully understand what happens to the alpha particle as it flies away from the radioactive atom into air and how it interacts with gases that make up air.
Can it collide with neutral gas atom,knock away one or more of its electrons without absorbing those electrons?
Does it stop after hitting just one atom,transfering all its kinetic energy into it or does it crash into multiple atoms along its path,losing speed gradualy? How many collisions will happen before it stops?
Imagine closed system,sort of chamber with impenetrable walls,there is single radioactive atom and neutral atoms.When the radioactive atom undergoes alpha decay,it creates the helium ion which will seek to absorb two electrons to become neutral.Problem I see is that there is now not enough electrons to make all atoms neutral,since there is +2 charged helium nucleus and all other atoms are neutral,so if it "sucked" two electrons to become neutral from some other atom,the victim neutral atom would then be left with +2 charge so the closed system will end up with permanent +2 charge.Is that assumption correct?