Radio Active Decay not constant

[Zakuska]

Rate of Radioactive Decay May Not Be Constant

Tuesday August 24, 2010Stanford University News reports that the rate of radioactive decay on Earth may be affected by the sun. This should come as a surprise to you if you've taken science class where the rate of decay has been assumed to be constant. After all, a constant rate of decay is presupposed in order to perform carbon-14 dating or to calculate radioisotope dosage for cancer treatments. The effect is believed to be related to neutrinos from the sun. Since neutrinos aren't known to directly interact with radioactive materials, another (undiscovered) particle may be involved. Don't expect the new findings to get you out of radioactivity calculations. The fluctuations in the decay rate are extremely minute. You'll still need to know how to calculate rate of decay and carbon-14 dating for any chemistry or physics class you may take!

http://chemistry.about.com/b/2010/08/24/rate-of-radioactive-decay-may-not-be-constant.htm

Shes is refering to this article...

The strange case of solar flares and radioactive elements

When researchers found an unusual linkage between solar flares and the inner life of radioactive elements on Earth, it touched off a scientific detective investigation that could end up protecting the lives of space-walking astronauts and maybe rewriting some of the assumptions of physics.

L.A. Cicero Peter Sturrock, professor emeritus of applied physics

BY DAN STOBER

It's a mystery that presented itself unexpectedly: The radioactive decay of some elements sitting quietly in laboratories on Earth seemed to be influenced by activities inside the sun, 93 million miles away.

Is this possible?

Researchers from Stanford and Purdue University believe it is. But their explanation of how it happens opens the door to yet another mystery.

There is even an outside chance that this unexpected effect is brought about by a previously unknown particle emitted by the sun. "That would be truly remarkable," said Peter Sturrock, Stanford professor emeritus of applied physics and an expert on the inner workings of the sun.

The story begins, in a sense, in classrooms around the world, where students are taught that the rate of decay of a specific radioactive material is a constant. This concept is relied upon, for example, when

anthropologists use carbon-14 to date ancient artifacts and when doctors determine the proper dose of radioactivity to treat a cancer patient.

<snip>

A surprise

Going back to take another look at the decay data from the Brookhaven lab, the researchers found a recurring pattern of 33 days. It was a bit of a surprise, given that most solar observations show a pattern of about 28 days

[thesometimesaint]

Zakuska:

Also from the article.

"Don't expect the new findings to get you out of radioactivity calculations. The fluctuations in the decay rate are extremely minute. You'll still need to know how to calculate rate of decay and carbon-14 dating for any chemistry or physics class you may take!".

Ps. Thought you might find this interesting.

PARIS -- Scientists at CERN said they had trapped dozens of hydrogen "antimatter" atoms, a technical feat that boosts research into one of the great puzzles of particle physics.

Under a theory expounded in 1931 by the eccentric British physicist Paul Dirac, when energy transforms into matter, it produces a particle and its mirror image -- called an anti-particle -- which holds the opposite electrical charge.

When particles and anti-particles collide, they annihilate each other in a small flash of energy.

If everything were equal at the birth of the cosmos, matter and anti-matter would have existed in the same quantities. The observable Universe would have had no chance of coming into being, as these opposing particles would have wiped each other out.

In reality, though, matter came to be far more dominant, and antimatter is rare.

But understanding why there is this huge imbalance presents a daunting technical challenge.

Until now, experiments have produced anti-atoms, namely of hydrogen, but only in a free state. That means they instantly collide with ordinary matter and get annihilated, making it impossible to measure them or study their structure.

In a paper published on Wednesday by the British journal Nature, a team at the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) in Geneva explain a method of snaring these so-called antihydrogen atoms.

Experiments conducted in its ALPHA laboratory found a way of using strong, complex magnetic fields and a vacuum to capture and hold the mirror-image particles apart from ordinary matter.

Thousands of antihydrogen atoms have been made in the lab, but in the most successful experiment so far, 38 have been trapped long enough -- one-tenth of a second -- for them to be studied.

"For reasons that no-one yet understands, nature ruled out antimatter," CERN physicist Jeffrey Hangst said.

"It is thus very rewarding, and a bit overwhelming, to look at the ALPHA device and know that it contains stable, neutral atoms of antimatter. This inspires us to work that much harder to see if antimatter holds some secret."

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[Tarski]

The fluctuations in the decay rate are extremely minute.

Zakuska always ignores the parts that make it clear that our typical and best dating methods are not in question and nothing he has found helps his apologetics even in the slightest.

NASA assumed zero friction for major portions of the journey when they made the calculations that got us to the moon. Zak is like a guy who finds a paper indicating a minute amount of friction even in interstellar space due to there being a few hydrogen atoms per cubic meter and then concludes that the moon landing was a hoax.

[Zakuska]

Didn't miss it at all Tarski.

However it does show that the Scientists were wrong. That it does fluctuate, and is effected by other things, and is infact NOT constant.

Another Article saying the same thing...

Radioactive decay rates may be more variable than once thought

This adds to evidence of swings in decay rates in response to solar activity and the distance between the Earth and the sun that Purdue researchers Ephraim Fischbach, a professor of physics, and Jere Jenkins, a nuclear engineer, have been gathering for the last four years. The Purdue team previously reported observing a drop in the rate of decay that began a day and half before and peaked during the December 2006 solar flare and an annual fluctuation that appeared to be based on the Earth's orbit of, and changing distance from, the sun, Jenkins said.

"If the relationship between solar activity and decay rates proves to be true, it could lead to a method of predicting solar flares, which could help prevent damage to satellites and electric grids, as well as save the lives of astronauts in space," Jenkins said. "Finding that the decay rates fluctuate in a pattern that matches known and theoretical solar frequencies is compelling evidence for a solar influence on decay rates."

Jenkins and Fischbach collaborated with Peter Sturrock, a professor emeritus of applied physics at Stanford University and an expert on the inner workings of the sun, to examine data collected at Brookhaven National Laboratory on the rate of decay of the radioactive isotopes silicon-32 and chlorine-36. The team reported in the journal Astroparticle Physics that the decay rate for both isotopes varies in a 33-day recurring pattern, which they attribute to the rotation rate of the sun's core.

In general, the fluctuations that Jenkins and Fischbach have found are around a tenth of a percent from what is expected, as they've examined available published data and taken some measurements themselves.

The team has not yet examined isotopes used in medical radiation treatments or for dating of ancient artifacts.

"The fluctuations we're seeing are fractions of a percent and are not likely to radically alter any major anthropological findings," Fischbach said. "One of our next steps is to look into the isotopes used medically to see if there are any variations that would lead to overdosing or underdosing in radiation treatments, but there is no cause for alarm at this point. What is key here is that what was thought to be a constant actually varies and we've discovered a periodic oscillation where there shouldn't be one."

Now it is intresting that the scientists give an "opinion" that it is "not likely to radically altar any major anthropological findings". However the sentence before does say that this is only a guess and they haven't applied the scientific method to the findings as of yet, so nobody really knows.

I say from observation that it's far more likely that the decay of radio active material is like pouring a soda into a cup. A bunch of bubbles form at the top and then they seem to disapate at pretty constant rate. However... if you tap the cup or bump the table, put your finger in the foam, blow, or drink a little. The bubbles will begin to disappate faster. Temperature can slow this down or speed it up as well.

This has been proven on an atomic level as well. Thorium exposed to other forms of radiation, like whats in rocks around uranium or in soils where uranium is found has been shown, to increase the decay rate as well. Just like my soda bubble analogy.

Here is the proof of that...

Several decades ago, strange fluctuations were observed in several radioactive decay systems. These systems have unstable nuclei that emit various particles and radiation until they stabilize. It was finally established that these seasonal fluctuations corresponded to the distance between the earth and the sun. When the earth is closest to the sun, solar neutrinos evidently accelerate nuclear decay.¹

Now, Italian research shows evidence that a process called

[Zakuska]

Yet another paper on Radioactive decay changes...

Modern science has been assuming for the past century that radioactive decay rates have always been constant. Therefore knowing the amount of radioactive material present they can extrapolate back to see how long it has taken to get to the present state. The first big assumption is that originally there was an xx percent concentration of radioactive material present in such and such a rock at the very beginning. The second assumption is that radioactive decay rates have stayed constant. We have only known about radioactive decay for about a century. We have at most observed radioactive decay rates for 20-30 years on any one sample of material. Based on say 50 years at most science is now extrapolating to 5 billion years or more. So 50 years out of 5 billion says that we have observed it for say .0000001% of its lifetime. Not very good is it! Rather incomplete and very weak. It's the best we have but do you want to stake your theories and reputation on something that has been observed for only .0000001% of its lifetime. Thats like saying we know how the stock market works because we watched it for one second. Because of this terrible weakness we at the Paleo Group are willing to say that radioactive decay dating schemes are only weak theories based on very incomplete evidence. Therefore we are keeping an open mind as to the age of everything from the past.

We now have scientific evidence that radioactive decay rates can change depending on their environment. This is really big big news. There have been hints of this condition for many years.

There are three known conditions where radioactive decay rates are known to change. The first example is that in a plasma state some radioactive materials have been shown to change their decay rates. This intuitively makes sense when you consider that a plasma state is a superheated state of matter. Since radioactive decay involves the nucleus which contains tightly bound particles it stands to reason that it would take a lot of energy to change how the nucleus reacted. This large amount ofenergy happens in several ways one of which is in the high energy plasma state. A Plasma state is a distinct phase of matter neither solid or liquid or gas. The plasma state is a gas like cloud generally consisting of charged particles stripped of their electrons and commonly thought of as "ionized gas". The second way which illustrates reducted nuclear decay rates occurs when some materials are subjected to ultrasonic cavitation. This also makes some sense when you consider that ultrasonics is a way to impart energy into small particles.

http://dinosaurc14ages.com/decay.htm

[LifeOnaPlate]

Speaking of radio, check out the latest FAIR Podcast with John Durham Peters! (relevant to the thread because we mention radio in the podcast)

http://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/fair-blog/id397315546

[Nofear]

As much as the article is interesting, I think it should be viewed with a greater degree of skepticism than implied by the original post. Bedding one's theology with bad physics leads to some really itchy situations.

Scientist Smackdown: Are Solar Neutrinos Messing With Matter?

[Zakuska]

Did you miss this from your linked article?

The critic admits that...

"Adelberger tells DISCOVER that he thinks the variation in decay that the labs like Brookhaven picked up is real"

The decay rate variations of a supposed constant are infact real. He just disagrees on what it is thats causing it.

Thanks for the Article though.

[thesometimesaint]

Zakuska:

It COULD also just be a artifact from the testing methodology or the machinery. We'll just have to WAFO.

[Zakuska]

Increasing the radioactive decay of thorium by a factor of 10,000 in a lab seems a little more conclusive to me dontcha think?

[Nofear]

Did you miss this from your linked article?

The critic admits that...

"Adelberger tells DISCOVER that he thinks the variation in decay that the labs like Brookhaven picked up is real"

The decay rate variations of a supposed constant are infact real. He just disagrees on what it is thats causing it.

Thanks for the Article though.

My comment was that the result should be treated with skepticism. To continue the quote you pulled from the posted blog post:

Adelberger tells DISCOVER that he thinks the variation in decay that the labs like Brookhaven picked up is real. But he agrees with Sullivan that the effect is much more likely to come from a problem with the instruments than some new physics from the sun. He also points to studies over the last couple years (here and here) that show no link between the sun and radioactive decay rates.

[Zakuska]

My comment was that the result should be treated with skepticism. To continue the quote you pulled from the posted blog post:

Which only proves my point... the decay rate isn't constant and they don't know what is causing it. Listing the studies that it isn't the suns nutrinos only shows that its possibly not the sun doing it, But doesn't answer the question of what is doing it?

In A study did just last year they increased the radio active decay of Thorium (a supposed constant ) by a factor of 10,000.

Now, Italian research shows evidence that a process called

[thesometimesaint]

http://www.asa3.org/ASA/resources/wiens.html

[Nofear]

Which only proves my point... the decay rate isn't constant and they don't know what is causing it. Listing the studies that it isn't the suns nutrinos only shows that its possibly not the sun doing it, But doesn't answer the question of what is doing it?

"But he agrees with Sullivan that the effect is much more likely to come from a problem with the instruments than some new physics from the sun" means that the decay rate could well be constant but the instrumentation may have been in error. I looked at arxiv.org and nobody is citing Jenkins and Fishbach. If the result is indeed real it will be validated by further research. So far, no such supporting evidence is present (but such studies do take time). Given that it also seems to contradict previous studies and the effect has no plausible theory of explanation puts the idea on very spurious footing. That is not to say that it couldn't be real but it does mean that it would be very premature to hang one's hat on that coat rack indeed.

I shan't bother to comment on thorium and cavity effects. Quite a different story than neutrinos.

[Zakuska]

"But he agrees with Sullivan that the effect is much more likely to come from a problem with the instruments than some new physics from the sun" means that the decay rate could well be constant but the instrumentation may have been in error. I looked at arxiv.org and nobody is citing Jenkins and Fishbach. If the result is indeed real it will be validated by further research. So far, no such supporting evidence is present (but such studies do take time). Given that it also seems to contradict previous studies and the effect has no plausible theory of explanation puts the idea on very spurious footing. That is not to say that it couldn't be real but it does mean that it would be very premature to hang one's hat on that coat rack indeed.

i would agree with this as well... but according to Tarski and others, the hats in the closet and it not coming out.

I shan't bother to comment on thorium and cavity effects. Quite a different story than neutrinos.

I agree... however it speaks to the truth that radio active decay is effected by outside forces... Which is something Libby assumed in his original thesis on C14, DID NOT and COULD NOT happen.

So if it happens with Thorium its a pretty safe bet that it can happend with other molecules as well.

[Zakuska]

The Thorium experiment from (1958-64) was repeated and duplicated just last year. (2009)

In a Letter appearing in this issue of Physics Letters A, Kowalski raises some critical comments on the experiment [F. Cardone, R. Mignani, A. Petrucci, Phys. Lett. A 373 (2009) 1956] that we carried out by cavitating a solution of Thorium-228. The experiment highlighted the anomalous decay of Thorium, thus confirming the results previously obtained by Urutskoev et al. by explosion of titanium foils in solutions. In this Letter, we reply to these comments. We agree with Kowalski that critical comments are one of the key factors of the process to improve the quality of experiments and the interpretation of results. However we do hope that these comments together with the details provided in the replies will promote further and better experiments which are certainly worth performing in order to shed a brighter light on this issue, as Kowalski himself suggests in his comment.

Click here

So I'd say that the Radio decay rate of Thorium has successfuly been proven and confirmed to CHANGE under the right conditions.

Radio Decay is not constant by any stretch of the word!

[Tarski]

i would agree with this as well... but according to Tarski and others, the hats in the closet and it not coming out.

I agree... however it speaks to the truth that radio active decay is effected by outside forces... Which is something Libby assumed in his original thesis on C14, DID NOT and COULD NOT happen.

So if it happens with Thorium its a pretty safe bet that it can happend with other molecules as well.

Other molecules?

[TAO]

Other molecules?

He means compounds or the pure elements themselves releasing particles.

[Tarski]

He means compounds or the pure elements themselves releasing particles.

Compounds? Then you are confused too.

[TAO]

Compounds? Then you are confused too.

Compounds can be radioactive too. Not necessarily for C-14, but for other radioactive elements, there are compounds made of them.

[Tarski]

In all of this, no one has yet set forth the simple facts.

C14 dating is good for carbonaceous materials back to about 60,000 years with well understood margins of error and well understood effects that may cause increased error. But, other kinds of radiometric dating go back much much further to hundreds of millions of years with an understood percent error.

The various types of dating cross check each other and aid in calibration. The various methods agree with each other when multiple methods are available. Also, physical theoretical considerations outside of the realm of dating proper show that geological processes require a time period consistant with radiodating. A good deal of perfectly fine indepently arrived at geophysics would stop making sense if the earth were much younger than the estimate of 4-5 billion years. It is completely impossible for the earth to be a mere few thoudsand years old.

"In general, the half-life of a nuclide depends solely on its nuclear properties; it is not affected by external factors such as temperature, pressure, chemical environment, or presence of a magnetic or electric field.[3][4][5] (For some nuclides which decay by the process of electron capture, such as Beryllium-7, Strontium-85, and Zirconium-89, the decay rate may be slightly affected by local electron density, therefore these isotopes may not be as suitable for radiometric dating.) But in general, the half-life of any nuclide is essentially a constant. Therefore, in any material containing a radioactive nuclide, the proportion of the original nuclide to its decay product(s) changes in a predictable way as the original nuclide decays over time. This predictability allows the relative abundances of related nuclides to be used as a clock to measure the time from the incorporation of the original nuclide(s) into a material to the present."--wiki

C14 half-life is not subject to external effects to any significant degree (in contrast even to the small effects one sees for reverse beta decay) and is properly treated as a constant. It is known to be constant to within margins of error that preclude there being any serious worries about dating error resulting from taking the half-life to be constant. It is constant by measurement and is numerically calculated to be constant by quantum field theory (the same constant that we measure!!!!).

Many types of radiometric dating for very ancient dates have error factors of several million years but this is a small relative percent error and as paleontologist Niles Eldredge notes

"A few million years sounds like a huge error, but a couple of million years one way or the other is a small error compared with the huge age calculated. Saying '380 million years plus or minus two million' is like thinking back to April from December and saying you can't remember whether something happened on the 19th, 20th, or 21st. "

No serious scientist doubts that the fossil record extends back millions of years and no serious scientist doubts that the age of the earth is measured in billions of years rather than millions (and thousands is laughably out of the question).

Religion and religion alone provides the only motivation for denying the science.

The final fact that needs to be mentioned is that the people most loudly protesting science here are also those that have shown in many ways that they least understand science, how to separate good science from bad science and how to judge the relevance of various scientific papers to their religious apologetics.

Zak, has not found even one thing to throw into doubt the estimates of the age of the earth, the age of fossils, or the approximate times for extinctions in ancient America. He is flooding the board with things he barely understands in hopes to overwhelm without taking a close look at issues of relevence and significance to his religious theses.

The irrelevance to religious apologetics would be true even if we were to grant as being accurate every single paper he has put forth (with the help of creationist websites). The variations and errors proposed are nowhere near big enough to make a lick of difference for fundamentalist religion.

Nothing that Zak has claimed is at the same time both true and significant for his anti-science religious apologetics. What is true is irrelevant and what is relevant isn't true (at least in the way he needs it to be).

[Zakuska]

Compounds can be radioactive too. Not necessarily for C-14, but for other radioactive elements, there are compounds made of them.

Oh C14 comes in radio active molecules thats a certianty... CO2 "molecules" are after all at the very bottom of the food chain in plant photosythesis. And is infact how C14 is introduced into the food chain, in the first place.

See Tarski was just trying to score some polemical points out of the coversation because his ego is bruised.

[TAO]

Oh C14 comes in radio active molecules thats a certianty... CO2 "molecules" are after all at the very bottom of the food chain in plant photosythesis. And is infact how C14 is introduced into the food chain, in the first place.

See Tarski was just trying to score some polemical points out of the coversation because his ego is bruised.

Hehe, ya' know, there might, just might be a very trace amount of number 108 or other high-isotope element somewhere in the universe right now ;-). Yah... even with Promethium... produced naturally in a star in a certain galaxy.

[Tarski]

Oh C14 comes in radio active molecules thats a certianty... CO2 "molecules" are after all at the very bottom of the food chain in plant photosythesis. And is infact how C14 is introduced into the food chain, in the first place.

See Tarski was just trying to score some polemical points out of the coversation because his ego is bruised.

Riiiight. It always bruises my ego when someone with insufficient scientific education and judgment decides to publically prove it in my presence.

[TAO]

Riiiight. It always bruises my ego when someone with insufficient scientific education and judgment decides to publically prove it in my presence.

Tarski, chill a bit, and rather than say he doesn't have 'this and this', instead explain why what he says is incorrect. It does not look good when you just sorta 'brush it off' if ya' know what I mean.