Researchers Measure Atom With Half-Life of 18 Sextillion Years

[We Never Know]

@Polymath257 . thought this might interest you.

Researchers Measure Atom With Half-Life of 18 Sextillion Years
from the first-time-ever dept.
A detector designed to hunt for dark matter has succeeded in detecting one of the rarest particle interactions in the universe. "According to a new study published today in the journal Nature, the team of more than 100 researchers measured, for the first time ever, the decay of a xenon-124 atom into a tellurium 124 atom through an extremely rare process called two-neutrino double electron capture," reports Live Science. "This type of radioactive decay occurs when an atom's nucleus absorbs two electrons from its outer electron shell simultaneously, thereby releasing a double dose of the ghostly particles called neutrinos."

Read more at....
Slashdot

 

[Cooky]

@Polymath257 . thought this might interest you.

Researchers Measure Atom With Half-Life of 18 Sextillion Years
from the first-time-ever dept.
A detector designed to hunt for dark matter has succeeded in detecting one of the rarest particle interactions in the universe. "According to a new study published today in the journal Nature, the team of more than 100 researchers measured, for the first time ever, the decay of a xenon-124 atom into a tellurium 124 atom through an extremely rare process called two-neutrino double electron capture," reports Live Science. "This type of radioactive decay occurs when an atom's nucleus absorbs two electrons from its outer electron shell simultaneously, thereby releasing a double dose of the ghostly particles called neutrinos."

Read more at....
Slashdot

That's a very, very long time. I need to find these "neutrinos", and absorb them somehow.

 

[Subduction Zone]

@Polymath257 . thought this might interest you.

Researchers Measure Atom With Half-Life of 18 Sextillion Years
from the first-time-ever dept.
A detector designed to hunt for dark matter has succeeded in detecting one of the rarest particle interactions in the universe. "According to a new study published today in the journal Nature, the team of more than 100 researchers measured, for the first time ever, the decay of a xenon-124 atom into a tellurium 124 atom through an extremely rare process called two-neutrino double electron capture," reports Live Science. "This type of radioactive decay occurs when an atom's nucleus absorbs two electrons from its outer electron shell simultaneously, thereby releasing a double dose of the ghostly particles called neutrinos."

Read more at....
Slashdot

Interesting. I wish they would have gone into detail on how they calculated the half life. One single decay is not enough to do a statistical calculation. Perhaps they based it on the energy of the decay. I have noticed that short half life atoms have a higher energy of decay.

 

[We Never Know]

Interesting. I wish they would have gone into detail on how they calculated the half life. One single decay is not enough to do a statistical calculation. Perhaps they based it on the energy of the decay. I have noticed that short half life atoms have a higher energy of decay.

A little Google search can produce many things. For example try here, it has more detail.

Researchers Just Measured an Atom with a Half-Life of 18 Sextillion Years | Live Science

 

[Aupmanyav]

I need to find these "neutrinos", and absorb them somehow.

It is very diffcult to find nutrinos because they don't interact with matter but just pass through. You cannot absorb them.

"In the vicinity of the Earth, about 65 billion (6.5×10 raised to power 10) solar neutrinos per second pass through every square centimeter perpendicular to the direction of the Sun."
Neutrino - Wikipedia

Elsewhere: 18 Times Quantum Particles Blew Our Minds in 2018

 

[Cooky]

It is very diffcult to find nutrinos because they don't interact with matter but just pass through. You cannot absorb them.

"In the vicinity of the Earth, about 65 billion (6.5×10 raised to power 10) solar neutrinos per second pass through every square centimeter perpendicular to the direction of the Sun."
Neutrino - Wikipedia

Elsewhere: 18 Times Quantum Particles Blew Our Minds in 2018

So they're uncontainable?

 

[ratiocinator]

A little Google search can produce many things. For example try here, it has more detail.

Researchers Just Measured an Atom with a Half-Life of 18 Sextillion Years | Live Science

Google scholar will often find the full paper (pdf): Observation of two-neutrino double electron capture in 124Xe with XENON1T

 

[Subduction Zone]

So they're uncontainable?

Totally. Most local neutrinos are from the Sun. Roughly 65 billion pass through a square centimeter facing the Sun every second. They go right through the Earth so even at night there is a steady stream of these neutrinos. How is does one contain something like that?

 

[Aupmanyav]

So they're uncontainable?

If they pass unhindered with the speed of light (186,000 miles/second) through 8000 miles of Eath's outer silicate solid crust, a highly viscous asthenosphere and mantle, a liquid outer core that is much less viscous than the mantle, and a solid inner core; how does one contain them?
We can create them, but once created, they are on their own. They are unstoppable.

 

[Subduction Zone]

A little Google search can produce many things. For example try here, it has more detail.

Researchers Just Measured an Atom with a Half-Life of 18 Sextillion Years | Live Science

Thank you. The first source made it appear to have been observed only once. Roughly one hundred decays is beginning to be statistically significant.