From Stanford University News a really wild must read science discovery.
h/t to Leif Svalgaard and WUWT reader “carbon-based-life-form”.
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.
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.
Random numbers
But that assumption was challenged in an unexpected way by a group of researchers from Purdue University who at the time were more interested in random numbers than nuclear decay. (Scientists use long strings of random numbers for a variety of calculations, but they are difficult to produce, since the process used to produce the numbers has an influence on the outcome.)
Ephraim Fischbach, a physics professor at Purdue, was looking into the rate of radioactive decay of several isotopes as a possible source of random numbers generated without any human input. (A lump of radioactive cesium-137, for example, may decay at a steady rate overall, but individual atoms within the lump will decay in an unpredictable, random pattern. Thus the timing of the random ticks of a Geiger counter placed near the cesium might be used to generate random numbers.)
As the researchers pored through published data on specific isotopes, they found disagreement in the measured decay rates – odd for supposed physical constants.
Checking data collected at Brookhaven National Laboratory on Long Island and the Federal Physical and Technical Institute in Germany, they came across something even more surprising: long-term observation of the decay rate of silicon-32 and radium-226 seemed to show a small seasonal variation. The decay rate was ever so slightly faster in winter than in summer.
Was this fluctuation real, or was it merely a glitch in the equipment used to measure the decay, induced by the change of seasons, with the accompanying changes in temperature and humidity?
“Everyone thought it must be due to experimental mistakes, because we’re all brought up to believe that decay rates are constant,” Sturrock said.
The sun speaks
On Dec 13, 2006, the sun itself provided a crucial clue, when a solar flare sent a stream of particles and radiation toward Earth. Purdue nuclear engineer Jere Jenkins, while measuring the decay rate of manganese-54, a short-lived isotope used in medical diagnostics, noticed that the rate dropped slightly during the flare, a decrease that started about a day and a half before the flare.
If this apparent relationship between flares and decay rates proves true, it could lead to a method of predicting solar flares prior to their occurrence, which could help prevent damage to satellites and electric grids, as well as save the lives of astronauts in space.
The decay-rate aberrations that Jenkins noticed occurred during the middle of the night in Indiana – meaning that something produced by the sun had traveled all the way through the Earth to reach Jenkins’ detectors. What could the flare send forth that could have such an effect?
Jenkins and Fischbach guessed that the culprits in this bit of decay-rate mischief were probably solar neutrinos, the almost weightless particles famous for flying at almost the speed of light through the physical world – humans, rocks, oceans or planets – with virtually no interaction with anything.
Then, in a series of papers published in Astroparticle Physics, Nuclear Instruments and Methods in Physics Research and Space Science Reviews, Jenkins, Fischbach and their colleagues showed that the observed variations in decay rates were highly unlikely to have come from environmental influences on the detection systems.
Reason for suspicion
Their findings strengthened the argument that the strange swings in decay rates were caused by neutrinos from the sun. The swings seemed to be in synch with the Earth’s elliptical orbit, with the decay rates oscillating as the Earth came closer to the sun (where it would be exposed to more neutrinos) and then moving away.
So there was good reason to suspect the sun, but could it be proved?
Enter Peter Sturrock, Stanford professor emeritus of applied physics and an expert on the inner workings of the sun. While on a visit to the National Solar Observatory in Arizona, Sturrock was handed copies of the scientific journal articles written by the Purdue researchers.
Sturrock knew from long experience that the intensity of the barrage of neutrinos the sun continuously sends racing toward Earth varies on a regular basis as the sun itself revolves and shows a different face, like a slower version of the revolving light on a police car. His advice to Purdue: Look for evidence that the changes in radioactive decay on Earth vary with the rotation of the sun. “That’s what I suggested. And that’s what we have done.”
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 – the rotation rate of the surface of the sun.
The explanation? The core of the sun – where nuclear reactions produce neutrinos – apparently spins more slowly than the surface we see. “It may seem counter-intuitive, but it looks as if the core rotates more slowly than the rest of the sun,” Sturrock said.
All of the evidence points toward a conclusion that the sun is “communicating” with radioactive isotopes on Earth, said Fischbach.
But there’s one rather large question left unanswered. No one knows how neutrinos could interact with radioactive materials to change their rate of decay.
“It doesn’t make sense according to conventional ideas,” Fischbach said. Jenkins whimsically added, “What we’re suggesting is that something that doesn’t really interact with anything is changing something that can’t be changed.”
“It’s an effect that no one yet understands,” agreed Sturrock. “Theorists are starting to say, ‘What’s going on?’ But that’s what the evidence points to. It’s a challenge for the physicists and a challenge for the solar people too.”
If the mystery particle is not a neutrino, “It would have to be something we don’t know about, an unknown particle that is also emitted by the sun and has this effect, and that would be even more remarkable,” Sturrock said.
Chantal Jolagh, a science-writing intern at the Stanford News Service, contributed to this story.
@oMan: Well, remember, the Sun is not really a ball of “hot gas” – it is an intensely charged sphere of plasma, which has a huge mangetic field, is broken into conductive layers of plasma which can affect rotation. Angular momentum of course comes into play, but the electric and magnetic effects must not be neglected.
son of mulder says:
August 24, 2010 at 2:59 am
The normal ballet dancer effect of increasing rate of spin by pulling in their arms gives the intuitive idea that the centre of the sun ought to be spinning quicker as rotating hydrogen was pulled in under gravity. ie conservation of angular momentum. But what happens when you consider a body undergoing nuclear fusion where the hygrogen becomes the denser helium and higher atoms. This activity is most intense in the core of the sun and as density increases through this action so rotation would slow so as to conserve angular momantum. Just a thought./
Hmm..density maybe, but the mass doesn’t increase, does it? On the contrary in fact. (Remember m=E/c².) To preserve momentum – wouldn’t it have to rotate even faster if it gets denser?
If the supposedly neutinosprinkling core indeed has a so much slower rotation, there has to be another explanation and probably not an obvious one.
Dave Springer says:
August 24, 2010 at 2:26 am
“Constancy of physical constants in all times in all places is axiomatic in physics. Experimentally we’ve only measured them in one remote corner of the cosmos during one brief moment in history.”
Physics is more open-minded than you might think. Cosmological theories in which fundamental “constants” vary secularly with the age of the universe have been taken very seriously over the past century. However, they tend to make strong predictions that have been empirically falsified. Fundamental constants have been experimentally measured over billions of parsecs of space, and hence billions of years of time, out to redshifts in excess of 3, where relativistic cosmological effects become dominant. In some cases, such as the fine structure constant (of considerable relevance to radioactive decay), these measurements are extraordinarily precise. Their constancy is very well-established.
….so what is the ‘medium’ by which two particles are said to be entanglement? (are they actually physically connected or does it work by ‘frequency’ communication) What is it’s maximum range? What is it’s power/strength? Does it work at speeds faster than the speed of light?
Yeah that was the point I made to my YEC scientist friends. Even if it’s real (I think it is) it isn’t going to compress billions of years into thousands of years.
Of course one can’t say that with absolute certainty. We don’t know what is causing the effect and therefore can’t say anything about the limits of the effect. For all we know the effect is unlimited and the cause could have been very abundant or intense in the past. I just try to keep an open mind and acknowledge there are more things in the universe than are dreampt of in science.
So are they proposing that nutrino flux supresses decay?
It would be interesting to see if a decay rate variation has been detected at UW-Madison (just south of the straight line path of the nutrino beam from Fermilab to Soudan, MN) since the MINOS experiment started. (or perhaps the beam spread is not wide enough to encompass the UW-campus)
Paul Birch says:
August 24, 2010 at 8:15 am
“Physics is more open-minded than you might think.”
I think physicists are the most open minded of all. However they’re not immune to the political consequences of giving ammunition to the non-academic side of the so-called culture war so they tend to keep their non-mainstream thoughts out of the press and confine it to discussion with other physicists. The fine tuning problem is a case in point. It’s widely acknowledged among physicists and there is no satisfying answer for it. Pressed to list the possibilities (there are four in the running) Intelligent Design is one of those four. The others are, off the top of my head, a theory of everything that requires the cosmological constant to have the value that it does, an nearly infinite number of universes with a nearly infinite range of physical constants, and one more that escapes me at the moment.
“Cosmological theories in which fundamental “constants” vary secularly with the age of the universe have been taken very seriously over the past century.”
Agreed, but they are viewed askance. As an example one physicist I know who publishes his black hole heresies through Arxiv informs me that any physicist who doubts that black holes actually exist or that naked singularities do exist he’s pretty much placed in the “crank” category in the back of people’s minds.
“However, they tend to make strong predictions that have been empirically falsified. Fundamental constants have been experimentally measured over billions of parsecs of space, and hence billions of years of time, out to redshifts in excess of 3, where relativistic cosmological effects become dominant.”
Actually that’s circular reasoning. You are using axioms in physics to support the notion that red shift is an accurate, reliable measure of distance (and hence time). What if the speed of light isn’t constant at all times in all places in the history of the universe? What’s that do to the theory behind the Hubble Constant?
One example I found somewhat difficult to argue with is a picture taken by the Hubble Space Telescope of the aftermath of a small galaxy that plowed through a large one. The larger galaxy appears like a pond that had a pebble dropped into it. The velocity of the propagating ripple is calculable and so is the distance away and velocity of the small galaxy. Unless the ripple is travelling far in excess of the speed of light then the collision happened several hundred million years ago.
“In some cases, such as the fine structure constant (of considerable relevance to radioactive decay), these measurements are extraordinarily precise. Their constancy is very well-established.”
They are only established at this time in history in this corner of the universe. That’s the whole point. At one time classical Newtonian mechanics was tested to extraordinarily precise values that appeared to explain the orbital motions of things. Then along came Einstein with a wacky theory of relativity that made certain predictions that no instruments were able to measure at the time. Today we routinely have to make corrections to atomic clocks (GPS system) that exist in reference frames (gravitional field strength and relative velocity) that are not very much different from each other (orbital velocity relative to the ground and gravitational anomalies due to differences in mass underlying the satellite as it travels over different regions of the earth).
Why would a 33 day core rotation affect neutrino production? Is there a bump in the core that sends more neutrinos?
How about a 33 day throb or pulse (expanding and contracting) like heart beat?
Now we need to analyze the Sun Spot peaks and minimums to see if the neutrinos are more prolific during the peak and less during the minimum. Perhaps we can actually gather real data to understand the Sun; verses the computer Sun models.
Do the same people that created the AGW models create the Sun models??
Espen says:
August 23, 2010 at 11:38 pm
Nasif Nahle: thanks, I glanced through that paper, but it doesn’t mention the solar flare part of the story, does it?
No, it doesn’t; it mentions only the correlation between radioactive decay rate and the distance Earth-Sun and they found nothing.
In 2007, SOHO researchers discovered that the solar core spins faster than the outer layers, which is at odds with the argument of this article. The observation from SOHO information was published on Science:
http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/316/5831/1591?cookietest=yes
From wikipedia – Solar sidereal rotation period
* 25.05 days at equator
* 25.38 days at 16° latitude
* 34.3 days at poles
Since the surface rotational speed is variable, why is everyone assuming that the “core” rotational speed is uniform at 33 days?
Chris says:
August 24, 2010 at 8:39 am
“So are they proposing that nutrino flux supresses decay?”
Enhances.
That neutrinos stimulate beta decay (and K-capture) is a necessary corollary of the standard model. The catch is that the reported effect seems to be much larger (by orders of magnitude) than would have been anticipated. So to make the mechanism work one would have to assume some resonant cross-section amplification, or interaction with a flux of something other than ordinary neutrinos.
Neutrinos cannot work in the scheme.
No need for experiments, as some have asked.
One could calculate the effect with Feynman diagrams. There is already one weak interaction vertex in the decay diagram. Introducing a second one , which would be needed when one tries to calculate the effect of the neutrino from the sun vertex, will take the probabilities to vanishing values, not the 0.2% effect that is claimed.
Only space time distortions, classically, and gravitons quantum mechanically could change decay rates in correlation with such distances, imo.
@Paul Birch (con’t)
I guess what I’m trying to say is that we have working knowledge that allows us to predict the behavior of matter & energy with accuracy & precision good enough to land a man on the moon, exploit quantum tunneling to make non-volatile memory chips (FLASH), and things of that nature. But at the same time as our instruments improve and we explore the proverbial edge of the envelope we see strange & unexpected things. Galaxies in the local cluster don’t move as they should relative to each other and their observed angular velocities should tear them apart. Hence we had to invent “dark matter” to explain it but we still have little clue about what dark matter really is other than some form of baryonic matter that appears to cluster in the neighborhood of galaxies and can only be detected through gravitational anomalies. There’s ostensibly 5x more dark matter than visible matter in the universe. Then there’s the recently detected acceleration of the expansion of space which is an even bigger, deeper mystery wherein the culprit is called “dark energy” which appears to be non-baryonic homogenously distributed energy of some sort that acts only over very great distances and eventually becomes stronger than gravity. If we use mass-energy conversion (e=mc^2) we find that 70% of the mass/energy in the observable universe is dark energy which is something we know nothing about and isn’t part, parcel, or predicted by the standard model. Quite frankly when we have no explanation of 95% of the “stuff” that makes up the observable universe that says to me that we are 95% ignorant. It’s like trying to make a map of the ocean floor and the life that exists there when all you have any direct knowledge of is the froth on the surface.
Then there’s Voyager and Pioneer anomalies. They aren’t moving at the expected velocities, they aren’t in the expected positions, and their RTG power supplies aren’t performing as expected. And the only thing that’s different about them is that they are closer to interstellar space (or farther removed from the sun) than anything else we launched on an outward trajectory. These were totally unexpected things and the best explanation so far is that axiomatic physical constants are not really constant but are rather influenced by some strange and unknown cause the sun is throwing off into the inner solar system that diminishes with distance from the source.
Given that we have no test theory of gravity in general (only a so far undetected “graviton” as the tranmission mechanism) and no theory of quantum gravity, no explanations for a wide range of phenomenon, I can only say that physics is very far from complete. We aren’t just filling in details. We are fundmentally ignorant and have only working knowledge that applies to this very limited regime in time and space and every time we push our working knowledge beyond the edge of the established envelope we get a big fat surprise.
God sits back and watches as the ants scurry about with more ferver as he pokes a stick into their decay rate.
This is weird; and I like Anna’s input.
See Anna, just when you thought you could relax, and do some knitting, all of a sudden your past catches up with you; and you have to do that Greek aha! thing.
I’m too rusty to have caught the Feynman thing Anna, but let’s suppose it was some other critter. I could imagine some intruder acting to stimulate a decay event; but they say that the decay rate slows; so it would have to be an inhibitting reaction.
Assuming all the data proves real and all those other disclaimers, this is likely going to shake up some ideas.
@Michael Flagg (at August 24, 2010 at 7:42 am)
We have two flying testbeds of this theory out there right now – Voyager I and II. …
In response to Jenkins et al., Peter Fleischer had examined if Cassini RTG decay rates depend on 1/r², with negative results (here: http://arxiv.org/abs/0809.4248).
But Jenkins et al. then found (here: http://arxiv.org/abs/0808.3283v1) the effect was phase shifted by 90°, with maximuma and minima around vernal and autumnal equinox — maybe a directional effect?
It’s interesting to read all of the opinions above. Let’s suppose the observations (the effect) of variable decay rate is real. The original results are confirmed to be true. We can even suppose that the cyclic variability might be strongly supportive of some solar linkage.
That (to me) raises two questions (at least).
1/ What is happening on the sun; to be sending us these messages ?
2/ What the blazes is the mechanism involved in the variable decay rate ?
At the moment (given the above scenario), I find the second question a darn side more fascinating than the first one.
Maybe it’s because that happens at our end of the laboratory; while we don’t have many observers out at the other end.
But what is fascinating here at WUWT, and all its pseudo spellings is the parts of this story that each poster seems to have latched on to. I’m guessing (the WAG) that you have to solve question #2 first before you need to worry much about #1.
Me, I can plead almost total ignorance; so I may just pick up my knitting and watch this in my armchair on the front verandah.
Nice way to start the day though.
Many people mention some sort of common sense test. This is irrelevant as our brains evolved to detect and understand the conditions which were relevant to survival and reproduction. This encompasses nothing in the area of high energy physics (or planetary climatology). Tests are only possible using machinery and mathematics.
Results that are counterintuitive are certain to arise (general relativity for example). Argument can be made with such theories on the grounds of math or science (which really should be considered the same thing if the science is done properly and given sufficient time to filter out observational error). An example would be the recently posted statistical attack on the Mann “hockey stick” which shows the problems in the math that was used. That a given observation doesn’t “make sense” is irrelevant for any conclusion that doesn’t affect what we observe in our lives every day.
For the proposed link between solar radiation of any type and radioactive decay I would expect a data set containing a fairly continuous set of observations of decay rates and distance to be useful. It would be easy and probably not too expensive to launch a radiation detector with a sample of cesium at the sun, and another one a few million km’s behind it to adjust for cyclicality and other variations in solar activity. This should provide a usable set of numbers, but I won’t waste any time trying to predict the results.
I’ve been lurking here since Nov 2009 and if I’ve learnt anything, it is “we didn’t expect it, we can’t explain it, so it must be caused by CO2 and the ensuing CAGW” – simples.
Dr. Lurtz says: August 24, 2010 at 9:11 am
Why would a 33 day core rotation affect neutrino production? Is there a bump in the core that sends more neutrinos?
Yes, it has a bump which slowly (at decadal rate) drifts along heliocentric longitude.
http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/LFC7.htm
Robert of Ottawa says:
August 24, 2010 at 12:00 am
CRS, Dr.P.H. August 23, 2010 at 9:38 pm
http://www.fnal.gov/
I wonder if the Fermilab IT people will be mystified by the sudden burst of traffic to their site?
——
Nah, no problem! They have some stout IT folks over there (I’m on campus quite often, the library is a wonderful place to do some work!)
Fermilab’s servers were recently pummeled when some science blogger mistakenly announced that Fermilab had discovered the mysterious Higgs Boson (“God particle”), please see:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/large-hadron-collider/7888012/Higgs-boson-discovery-rumours-false-say-Tevatron-scientists.html
There are so many influences that we are just learning about, including the existence and influences of dark matter!! I invite all WUWT readers to really mine the website, and subscribe to the free e-newsletter “Fermilab Today” via this link:
http://www.fnal.gov/pub/today/
Very pertinent to these ongoing discussions at WUWT! Cheers, Charles the DrPH
I’m amazed at this in more than one way.
That with all the years spent looking for neutrinos, and how so few “captures” were made in that time. That enough “neutrinos” interacted or communicated with the material in their lab is…nothing short of amazing!
To be able to predict a solar flare in advance? Holy smokes – if this observation were to bear out, that is a very big discovery. Tied in with the core rotating at a different rate than the zones above it…. wow.
All in all, this is basic science being re-examined and coming to the realization that we know so little.
I like that. I like that a lot.
Don’t ask me why, but this brings to mind astrology… something that science says can’t work, but millions of people swear does, indeed, work. Science has always maintained that astrology can’t work because there is no known mechanism for the planets and Sun to affect humans, their predispositions and what happens in their lives. That conclusion was drawn several decades – if not centuries – ago, and science has leaned on that earlier conclusion ever since.
With these discoveries and others like them happening from time to time, science continually shows that previously unknown connections/mechanisms are out there, waiting for some -often accidental or serendipitous – credentialed scientist to have it fall in his/her lap.
When some new effect comes along, are their any scientist out there who runs over the things previously ruled “impossible,” just to see if it might change things? Of course, not. To touch those embargoed ideas, even with a ten-foot test tube, would risk that scientist’s credentials.
. . . I am just askin’. . . and laughing.
EVERY YEAR. EVERY YEAR. EVERY YEAR.
Every YEAR, an article like this comes out. Some years we get more than one. And some scientist is quoted as saying something like, “Well, we were dumbfounded when this happened, and now we have to throw out everything we think we knew about this and start over again.” (Think comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 in 1994…)
We’ve ALL read this kind of article before. Everyone here.
And every time we do, we see scientists putting on their, “We are just numb nuts in this vast universe” faces. The the very next day they put their normal faces on again – the faces that tell us that scientists are wise and all-knowing, and tell us “Don’t ask such stupid questions, layman!” and “We are the experts!” and “Move along; there is nothing to see here.”
I even have a folder on my PC labeled “SCIENCE DOES IT AGAIN.”
* * * *
BTW:
1. Just WHY do they assume it is a PARTICLE? (not a wave?)
2. And WHY do they assume it went THROUGH the Earth? (not an effect that somehow went around the Earth, possibly via the atmosphere or one that is deflected by geomagnetism? or one that effects the entire Earth’s magnetic field? or _____?)
Such narrow minds. And with their jumping to conclusions, off they go, galavanting after some windmill to fight. Sound familiar? Detect something new, jump to a conclusion… Will they blame it on human activity?
ARE – Anthropogenic Radioactive Effect. Wait and see. . .
To Leif,
my colleagues have pointed out to me, this is another proof of the fifth force:
http://tech.mit.edu/V105/N58/force.58n.html
by the same people
I hate to inform this author, Dan Stober, but Carbon 14’s half-life has LONG been known to not be constant. The period from 32,000-40,000 BP is especially problematic, in that they have trouble dating artifacts in that period. It is not known for sure why, but some suspect a nearby supernova flooded the Earth with high energy particles that screwed with the atmospheric Nitrogen-to-Carbon transformation process.