Is the Sun Emitting a Mystery Particle?

[nmap]

Fascinating possibilities. This hints at the ability to control radioactivity - to increase it, perhaps even to decrease it. At the limits, it might be possible to make very small nuclear weapons, to improve (or clean up?) radiological weapons, to clean up nuclear waste, even to bring a new generation of nuclear power plants online.

Probably it will take a long, long time to take a discovery like this to something useful. I doubt that any of us will see it come to pass. But back in the 1750's (Back when they spoke proper English!) people were just starting to learn about electricity - for example, Benjamin Franklin and his kite. After a few hundred years, we do a lot with electricity.

So...maybe...in a century or so...we'll be up to speed on nuclear materials.


LINK


When probing the deepest reaches of the Cosmos or magnifying our understanding of the quantum world, a whole host of mysteries present themselves. This is to be expected when pushing our knowledge of the Universe to the limit.

But what if a well-known -- and apparently constant -- characteristic of matter starts behaving mysteriously?

This is exactly what has been noticed in recent years; the decay rates of radioactive elements are changing. This is especially mysterious as we are talking about elements with "constant" decay rates -- these values aren't supposed to change. School textbooks teach us this from an early age.

This is the conclusion that researchers from Stanford and Purdue University have arrived at, but the only explanation they have is even weirder than the phenomenon itself: The sun might be emitting a previously unknown particle that is meddling with the decay rates of matter. Or, at the very least, we are seeing some new physics.

Many fields of science depend on measuring constant decay rates. For example, to accurately date ancient artifacts, archaeologists measure the quantity of carbon-14 found inside organic samples at dig sites. This is a technique known as carbon dating.

Carbon-14 has a very defined half-life of 5730 years; i.e. it takes 5,730 years for half of a sample of carbon-14 to radioactively decay into stable nitrogen-14. Through spectroscopic analysis of the ancient organic sample, by finding out what proportion of carbon-14 remains, we can accurately calculate how old it is.

But as you can see, carbon dating makes one huge assumption: radioactive decay rates remain constant and always have been constant. If this new finding is proved to be correct, even if the impact is small, it will throw the science community into a spin.

Interestingly, researchers at Purdue first noticed something awry when they were using radioactive samples for random number generation. Each decay event occurs randomly (hence the white noise you'd hear from a Geiger counter), so radioactive samples provide a non-biased random number generator.

However, when they compared their measurements with other scientists' work, the values of the published decay rates were not the same. In fact, after further research they found that not only were they not constant, but they'd vary with the seasons. Decay rates would slightly decrease during the summer and increase during the winter.

SLIDE SHOW: Seeing the Sun in a New Light, The First Solar Dynamics Observatory Images

Experimental error and environmental conditions have all been ruled out -- the decay rates are changing throughout the year in a predictable pattern. And there seems to be only one answer.

As the Earth is closer to the sun during the winter months in the Northern Hemisphere (our planet's orbit is slightly eccentric, or elongated), could the sun be influencing decay rates?

In another moment of weirdness, Purdue nuclear engineer Jere Jenkins noticed an inexplicable drop in the decay rate of manganese-54 when he was testing it one night in 2006. It so happened that this drop occurred just over a day before a large flare erupted on the sun.

Did the sun somehow communicate with the manganese-54 sample? If it did, something from the sun would have had to travel through the Earth (as the sample was on the far side of our planet from the sun at the time) unhindered.

The sun link was made even stronger when Peter Sturrock, Stanford professor emeritus of applied physics, suggested that the Purdue scientists look for other recurring patterns in decay rates. As an expert of the inner workings of the sun, Sturrock had a hunch that solar neutrinos might hold the key to this mystery.

Sure enough, the researchers noticed the decay rates vary repeatedly every 33 days -- a period of time that matches the rotational period of the core of the sun. The solar core is the source of solar neutrinos.

It may all sound rather circumstantial, but these threads of evidence appear to lead to a common source of the radioactive decay rate variation. But there's a huge problem with speculation that solar neutrinos could impact decay rates on Earth: neutrinos aren't supposed to work like that.

Neutrinos, born from the nuclear processes in the core of the sun, are ghostly particles. They can literally pass through the Earth unhindered as they so weakly interact. How could such a quantum welterweight have any measurable impact on radioactive samples in the lab?

In short, nobody knows.

If neutrinos are the culprits, it means we are falling terribly short of understanding the true nature of these subatomic particles. But if (and this is a big if) neutrinos aren't to blame, is the sun generating an as-yet-to-be- discovered particle?

If either case is true, we'll have to go back and re-write those textbooks.

[dr. mabuse]

Nice article nmap.

You mean scientists aren't, em, uh, sure about these things???

Stay tuned

[nmap]

Originally Posted by dr. mabuse

Nice article nmap.

You mean scientists aren't, em, uh, sure about these things???

Thanks!

In all seriousness, I suspect no good scientist is ever sure...

[Green Light]

Originally Posted by nmap

Thanks!

In all seriousness, I suspect no good scientist is ever sure...

I would disagree. The best way to ruin your career as a scientist is to question orthodoxy.

[GratefulCitizen]

Radioactive decay rates not being constant is nothing new.
There is resistance to the idea because it throws doubt on carbon-14 dating, Uniformitarianism, and therefore evolution.

(Nevermind the other dating techniques which throw doubt on carbon dating, like helium migration in quartz crystals, decay of the Earth's magnetic field, etc...)

Back in 1999, Dr. Fritz Bosch discovered that, under certain conditions, Rhenium-187 decay rates could vary by nine orders of magnitude.
http://scitation.aip.org/getabs/serv...ifs=yes&ref=no

In 1989, William A. Barker received a patent on a device which accelerated decay rates of radioactive waste products.
http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-P...&RS=PN/5076971

Maybe scientists should revisit their assumptions.
Nah, that might undermine their belief system (and funding).


This reminds me of the "space bubble" thread from a couple years ago.
http://www.professionalsoldiers.com/...t=space+bubble

[The Reaper]

Global warming.

TR

[cold1]

Maybe a real nuetrino detector that does not have to be miillions of gallons of water underground.

[craigepo]

Great. Another excuse for not being able to make a commo shot.

[dr. mabuse]

Originally Posted by GratefulCitizen

Radioactive decay rates not being constant is nothing new.
There is resistance to the idea because it throws doubt on carbon-14 dating, Uniformitarianism, and therefore evolution.

(Nevermind the other dating techniques which throw doubt on carbon dating, like helium migration in quartz crystals, decay of the Earth's magnetic field, etc...)

Back in 1999, Dr. Fritz Bosch discovered that, under certain conditions, Rhenium-187 decay rates could vary by nine orders of magnitude.
http://scitation.aip.org/getabs/serv...ifs=yes&ref=no

In 1989, William A. Barker received a patent on a device which accelerated decay rates of radioactive waste products.
http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-P...&RS=PN/5076971

Maybe scientists should revisit their assumptions.
Nah, that might undermine their belief system (and funding).


This reminds me of the "space bubble" thread from a couple years ago.
http://www.professionalsoldiers.com/...t=space+bubble

O.K. The UPS drivers must be different out west.

The UPS driver that delivered some goodies for the Colt today could hardly follow what I was saying about the cooler weather!

Next time, maybe I should just jump right into something lighter like the research by Dr. Gunter Nimtz and Dr. Alfons Stahlhofen of the University of Koblenz on teleporting quantum states or even better, Information Mechanics by Frederick Kantor.

I now wonder what the Fed-Ex people are discussing during lunch.

BTW, long, long ago, in a galaxy far away, as a research gnome earning some much needed extra credit, I noticed some possible "fudging" of numbers by the doctor who was receiving the grants.

[TOMAHAWK9521]

Originally Posted by craigepo

Great. Another excuse for not being able to make a commo shot.

About time. 18Es were having a bitch of a time coming up with an excuse as to why the SATCOM traffic didn't go through. In the past it was the E/F layers of the Ionosphere or Tropospheric Ducting. Those didn't fly with SATCOM. At last, vindication!

[Utah Bob]

Originally Posted by Green Light

I would disagree. The best way to ruin your career as a scientist is to question orthodoxy.

True.
Just because you ruin your career doesn't mean you're not a good scientist though.

[CSB]

So far I have not seen anything unusual.

After all, both nuclear reactors and nuclear weapons accelerate the radioactive decay of their materials, either to a half life that drops down to months or years; or -- in the case of a nuclear detonation -- to nanoseconds.

The materials would otherwise decay equally as surely, just much more slowly.

[nmap]

I'm under the impression that natural decay is different from fission, whether induced or otherwise.

In fission, U235 --> Kr92 + Ba142

But in decay, the products and modality are different:

Decay products of U-235 include Th-231, Pa-231, actinium-227 (Ac-227), Th-227,Ra-223,Rn-219, Po-215, Pb-211, Bi-211 and thallium-207 (Tl-207).

Isotopes of natural uranium decay by emitting mainly alpha particles. The emission of beta particles and gamma radiations are low. The table below shows the average energies per transformation emitted by U-238, U-235 and U-234.

LINK

[GratefulCitizen]

Originally Posted by dr. mabuse

O.K. The UPS drivers must be different out west.

The UPS driver that delivered some goodies for the Colt today could hardly follow what I was saying about the cooler weather!

Next time, maybe I should just jump right into something lighter like the research by Dr. Gunter Nimtz and Dr. Alfons Stahlhofen of the University of Koblenz on teleporting quantum states or even better, Information Mechanics by Frederick Kantor.

I now wonder what the Fed-Ex people are discussing during lunch.

BTW, long, long ago, in a galaxy far away, as a research gnome earning some much needed extra credit, I noticed some possible "fudging" of numbers by the doctor who was receiving the grants.

<chuckle>
We get that alot.

FWIW, half the drivers in my center have 4-year degrees, and most of the others were on their way before taking a driver job.
An important term which does not apply to UPS drivers: overtime exempt.

Hard to judge people by soley by their profession/education.
Nerds are everywhere.

Among my close friends, there is a software engineer who did the lion's share of programming for a system which has made his company ~$750,000,000.
-(He took a whole 2 computer classes in college.)
There is an orbital analyst who developed a method for dramatically extending service life of satellites -- for which he received an award from NASA.
-(IIRC, he did this prior to getting his degree in aerospace engineering.)
There is a college dropout who works at Target and has several side businesses; he's the smartest of the bunch, makes the most money, and is mulling over retirement at age 36.
-(He only took one or two econ classes in college.)

Discussions with them get quite interesting.

Got an idea from a book recommended by RL. http://www.professionalsoldiers.com/...ad.php?t=22390
Bounced it off of the 3 of them to see if the idea was mathematically sound.

We formed an informal 4-way partnership to develop it.
It may prove to be effective and profitable, given recent technology.

Nerds are everywhere.
*********
*********

TR hits a bigger issue with the global warming comment.

Scientists covet political/moral authority.
Politicized science is dangerous.

Science can sometimes tell us what is/ what was/ what can be.
However, when science tries to tell us what we should do...

Don't need to look further than eugenics to see the danger of politicized science.

[dr. mabuse]

Originally Posted by GratefulCitizen

<chuckle>

Hard to judge people by soley by their profession/education.
Nerds are everywhere.

Too true. When I was 12, I worked at the Rose Gardens in Tyler, TX. The old man that was my boss used to be a professor at Stanford. Very interesting conversations while weeding out the rose beds.

On the lighter side, I fondly remember watching someone hosing down his lawnmower because he spilled some gas on it while refueling.

He was completely confounded as to why it wouldn't start.

He has 3 doctorates. Go figure.