Internal conversion is a
radioactive decay process wherein an excited
nucleus interacts
electromagnetically with one of the
orbital electrons of the atom. This causes the electron to be emitted (ejected) from the atom. Thus, in an internal conversion process, a high-energy electron is emitted from the radioactive atom, but not from the nucleus. For this reason, the high-speed electrons resulting from internal conversion are not
beta particles, since the latter come from
beta decay, where they are newly created in the nuclear decay process.