Mysteriously, Solar Activity Found to Influence Behavior of Radioactive Materials On Earth
The Sun NASA How's this for spooky action at a distance? The sun, at 93 million miles away, appears to be influencing the decay of radioactive elements inside the Earth, researchers say. Given what we know about radioactivity and solar neutrinos, this should not happen. It's so bizarre that a couple scientists at Stanford and Purdue universities believe there's a chance that a previously unknown solar particle is behind it all. The big news, according to Stanford's news service, is that the core of the sun -- where nuclear reactions produce neutrinos -- spins more slowly than the surface. This phenomenon might explain changing rates of radioactive decay scientists observed at two separate labs. But it does not explain why the decay-change happens. That violates the laws of physics as we know them. While examining data on radioactive isotopes, Purdue researchers found disagreement in measured decay rates, which goes...