The different types of radiation ionize to different degrees. Ionization is any process in which one or more electrons are removed from an atom or molecule, leaving the atom or molecule as a positively charged ion (cation). Each type of radiation is therefore assigned a dimensionless weighting factor that expresses its biological effectiveness. For X-rays, gamma and beta radiation, the factor is one, alpha radiation reaches a factor of twenty, and for neutron radiation it is between five and twenty, depending on the energy.