788 research outputs found
Study of the dependence of 198Au half-life on source geometry
We report the results of an experiment to determine whether the half-life of
\Au{198} depends on the shape of the source. This study was motivated by recent
suggestions that nuclear decay rates may be affected by solar activity, perhaps
arising from solar neutrinos. If this were the case then the -decay
rates, or half-lives, of a thin foil sample and a spherical sample of gold of
the same mass and activity could be different. We find for \Au{198},
, where
is the mean half-life. The maximum neutrino flux at the sample in our
experiments was several times greater than the flux of solar neutrinos at the
surface of the Earth. We show that this increase in flux leads to a significant
improvement in the limits that can be inferred on a possible solar contribution
to nuclear decays.Comment: 5 pages, 1 figur
Power Spectrum Analysis of LMSU (Lomonosov Moscow State University) Nuclear Decay-Rate Data: Further Indication of r-Mode Oscillations in an Inner Solar Tachocline
This article presents a power-spectrum analysis of 2,350 measurements of the
Sr/Y decay process acquired over the interval 4 August 2002 to 6
February 2009 at the Lomonosov Moscow State University (LMSU). As we have found
for other long sequences of decay measurements, the power spectrum is dominated
by a very strong annual oscillation. However, we also find a set of
low-frequency peaks, ranging from 0.26 year to 3.98 year, which
are very similar to an array of peaks in a power spectrum formed from Mt Wilson
solar diameter measurements. The Mt Wilson measurements have been interpreted
in terms of r-mode oscillations in a region where the sidereal rotation
frequency is 12.08 year. We find that the LMSU measurements may also be
attributed to the same type of r-mode oscillations in a solar region with the
same sidereal rotation frequency. We propose that these oscillations occur in
an inner tachocline that separates the radiative zone from a more slowly
rotating solar core.Comment: 5 pages, 8 figures. v2 corrects three typographical errors on page 3,
including the missing list of r-modes in sec. 3, para
The off-Shell Electromagnetic Vertex of the Nucleon in Chiral Perturbation Theory
We study the electromagnetic vertex of a nucleon in next-to-leading order
chiral perturbation theory (CPT). We consider the case where one of the
nucleons at the NN vertex is off its mass shell. We define relevant
measures for the off-shell dependence in the limited kinematical range allowed,
and analyze their expansion in the pion mass. The leading nonanalytic
contributions are calculated to estimate their size.Comment: 12 pages (LaTeX), 1 figure (available upon request), NIKHEF 93-P
Searches for solar-influenced radioactive decay anomalies using Spacecraft RTGs
Experiments showing a seasonal variation of the nuclear decay rates of a
number of different nuclei, and decay anomalies apparently related to solar
flares and solar rotation, have suggested that the Sun may somehow be
influencing nuclear decay processes. Recently, Cooper searched for such an
effect in Pu nuclei contained in the radioisotope thermoelectric
generators (RTGs) on board the Cassini spacecraft. In this paper we modify and
extend Cooper's analysis to obtain constraints on anomalous decays of
Pu over a wider range of models, but these limits cannot be applied to
other nuclei if the anomaly is composition-dependent. We also show that it may
require very high sensitivity for terrestrial experiments to discriminate among
some models if such a decay anomaly exists, motivating the consideration of
future spacecraft experiments which would require less precision.Comment: 8 pages, 4 figures (to appear in Astroparticle Physics
Power Spectrum Analysis of Physikalisch-Technische Bundesanstalt Decay-Rate Data: Evidence for Solar Rotational Modulation
Evidence for an anomalous annual periodicity in certain nuclear decay data
has led to speculation concerning a possible solar influence on nuclear
processes. We have recently analyzed data concerning the decay rates of Cl-36
and Si-32, acquired at the Brookhaven National Laboratory (BNL), to search for
evidence that might be indicative of a process involving solar rotation.
Smoothing of the power spectrum by weighted-running-mean analysis leads to a
significant peak at frequency 11.18/yr, which is lower than the equatorial
synodic rotation rates of the convection and radiative zones. This article
concerns measurements of the decay rates of Ra-226 acquired at the
Physikalisch-Technische Bundesanstalt (PTB) in Germany. We find that a similar
(but not identical) analysis yields a significant peak in the PTB dataset at
frequency 11.21/yr, and a peak in the BNL dataset at 11.25/yr. The change in
the BNL result is not significant since the uncertainties in the BNL and PTB
analyses are estimated to be 0.13/yr and 0.07/yr, respectively. Combining the
two running means by forming the joint power statistic leads to a highly
significant peak at frequency 11.23/yr. We comment briefly on the possible
implications of these results for solar physics and for particle physics.Comment: 15 pages, 13 figure
Analysis of Gamma Radiation from a Radon Source: Indications of a Solar Influence
This article presents an analysis of about 29,000 measurements of gamma
radiation associated with the decay of radon in a sealed container at the
Geological Survey of Israel (GSI) Laboratory in Jerusalem between 28 January
2007 and 10 May 2010. These measurements exhibit strong variations in time of
year and time of day, which may be due in part to environmental influences.
However, time-series analysis reveals a number of periodicities, including two
at approximately 11.2 year and 12.5 year. We have previously
found these oscillations in nuclear-decay data acquired at the Brookhaven
National Laboratory (BNL) and at the Physikalisch-Technische Bundesanstalt
(PTB), and we have suggested that these oscillations are attributable to some
form of solar radiation that has its origin in the deep solar interior. A
curious property of the GSI data is that the annual oscillation is much
stronger in daytime data than in nighttime data, but the opposite is true for
all other oscillations. This may be a systematic effect but, if it is not, this
property should help narrow the theoretical options for the mechanism
responsible for decay-rate variability.Comment: 9 pages, 21 figure
Recoil Order Chiral Corrections to Baryon Octet Axial Currents and Large QCD
We compute the chiral corrections to octet baryon axial currents through
in heavy baryon chiral perturbation theory, including both
octet and decuplet baryon intermediate states. We include the latter in a
consistent way by using the small scale expansion. We find that, in contrast to
the situation at , there exist no cancellations between octet
and decuplet contributions at . Consequently, the corrections spoil the expected scaling behavior of the chiral
expansion. We discuss this result in terms of the expansion. We also
consider the implications for determination of the strange quark contribution
to the nucleon spin from polarized deep inelastic scattering data.Comment: 7 page
Further Evidence Suggestive of a Solar Influence on Nuclear Decay Rates
Recent analyses of nuclear decay data show evidence of variations suggestive
of a solar influence. Analyses of datasets acquired at the Brookhaven National
Laboratory (BNL) and at the Physikalisch-Technische Bundesanstalt (PTB) both
show evidence of an annual periodicity and of periodicities with sidereal
frequencies in the neighborhood of 12.25 year^{-1} (at a significance level
that we have estimated to be 10^{-17}). It is notable that this implied
rotation rate is lower than that attributed to the solar radiative zone,
suggestive of a slowly rotating solar core. This leads us to hypothesize that
there may be an "inner tachocline" separating the core from the radiative zone,
analogous to the "outer tachocline" that separates the radiative zone from the
convection zone. The Rieger periodicity (which has a period of about 154 days,
corresponding to a frequency of 2.37 year^{-1}) may be attributed to an r-mode
oscillation with spherical-harmonic indices l=3, m=1, located in the outer
tachocline. This suggests that we may test the hypothesis of a solar influence
on nuclear decay rates by searching BNL and PTB data for evidence of a
"Rieger-like" r-mode oscillation, with l=3, m=1, in the inner tachocline. The
appropriate search band for such an oscillation is estimated to be 2.00-2.28
year^{-1}. We find, in both datasets, strong evidence of a periodicity at 2.11
year^{-1}. We estimate that the probability of obtaining these results by
chance is 10^{-12}.Comment: 12 pages, 6 figures, v2 has a color corrected Fig 6, a corrected
reference, and a corrected typ
Measurement of Fluorescence Phenomena from Yttrium and Gadolinium Oxysulfide Phosphors using a 45-MeV Proton Beam
This research was sponsored by the National Science Foundation Grant NSF PHY-931478
Solar Influence on Nuclear Decay Rates: Constraints from the MESSENGER Mission
We have analyzed Cs-137 decay data, obtained from a small sample onboard the
MESSENGER spacecraft en route to Mercury, with the aim of setting limits on a
possible correlation between nuclear decay rates and solar activity. Such a
correlation has been suggested recently on the basis of data from Mn-54 decay
during the solar flare of 13 December 2006, and by indications of an annual and
other periodic variations in the decay rates of Si-32, Cl-36, and Ra-226. Data
from five measurements of the Cs-137 count rate over a period of approximately
5.4 years have been fit to a formula which accounts for the usual exponential
decrease in count rate over time, along with the addition of a theoretical
solar contribution varying with MESSENGER-Sun separation. The indication of
solar influence is then characterized by a non-zero value of the calculated
parameter \xi, and we find \xi=(2.8+/-8.1)x10^{-3} for Cs-137. A simulation of
the increased data that can hypothetically be expected following Mercury orbit
insertion on 18 March 2011 suggests that the anticipated improvement in the
determination of \xi could reveal a non-zero value of \xi if present at a level
consistent with other data.Comment: Accepted for publication in Astrophysics and Space Science, 2011. 7
pages, 5 figures. Version 2 has corrected Figure 1, since Fig. 1 did not
appear correctly in Version
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