Evidence for Correlations Between Nuclear Decay Rates and Earth-Sun Distance

SOL

http://arxiv.org/PS_cache/arxiv/pdf/0808/0808.3283v1.pdf

"Unexplained periodic fluctuations in the decay rates of 32Si and 226Ra have been reported
by groups at Brookhaven National Laboratory (32Si), and at the Physikalisch-Technische-
Bundesandstalt in Germany (226Ra). We show from an analysis of the raw data in these experiments
that the observed fluctuations are strongly correlated in time, not only with each other, but also with
the distance between the Earth and the Sun. Some implications of these results are also discussed,
including the suggestion that discrepancies in published half-life determinations for these and other
nuclides may be attributable in part to differences in solar activity during the course of the various
experiments, or to seasonal variations in fundamental constants."

This all seems very interesting and at odds with anything else I learned, any comments?

Volker

The authors propose that the effect is probably due to the varying neutrino flux. This seems plausible enough. Though I'd like to see a more thorough investigation that addresses the following two issues:

1) Calculate a quantitative estimate of the effect of varying neutrino flux on the decay rates

2) The phase shift between the sun-earth distance and the decay rate needs to be explained. The authors propose that this is a binning effect without further explanation. One should revisit the decay rate experiments and center the bins in time.

Professor_Fink

SOL wrote: »

http://arxiv.org/PS_cache/arxiv/pdf/0808/0808.3283v1.pdf

This all seems very interesting and at odds with anything else I learned, any comments?

Volker's comments about neutrino flux do seem the obvious answer, as neutrino oscillations have been clearly observed through the earths orbit.

One way this could be confirmed would be by using controlled neutrino flux from a research reactor. Actually, I expect it's a relatively simple experiment for a group with the right equipment.