Do radioactive decay phases happen at a rate faster than the speed of light?
815878
Radio-active decay is measured with half lives, that is a time when half the matter of a sample would have disintegrated.  That is a rate, which is not a speed, so the speed of light is totally unrelated.
1107829
There is no question that light obeys its speed limit. And I agree with the many others who said that light will travel to infinity unless it is absorbed by matter. But what if there were a distance limit? Now it may not make sense to say that a photon of light has a distance limit, but it could possibly be correct that photons of light have a lifetime, albeit very very long. \n\nScience theorizes that the 3-degree Kelvin background radiation we see everywhere is what is left from the initial Big Bang. Based on this temperature, cosmologists tell us the universe is somewhere between 11.2 billion to 20 billion years old. BUT, what if photons decay like radioactive particles and have a half-life? What if their half-life were 1 billion years? There would be too much 3-degree background radiation around to be explained by a universe between 11.2 billion and 20 billion years old. So the universe would have to be much younger and as a consequence, much smaller. \n\nYour question provoked a cool idea which I'm sure has been provoked' before.
77099
it would be called superluminal.\n\nyou can read more about it here - \nhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Faster_than_light
973296
hi Fellow Genius !,\ngood question.\n\nYES. Protons do decay. they have an average lifetime of about 10 to the power 32 years. Now, since this is an average, it should be possible to monitor a large enough collection of protons, and observe a few decays in the space of an year or so. Such experiments, involving 100s of tons of H2O or some other material, are underway in many parts of the world [eg.: a cave 600m below Lake Erie, Ohio]. However, none of them have yet [so far as I know] found any convincing evidence for the "predicted" decays of protons. [will answer part 2&3 of ur Q seperately] contact me at email address: fizamaker@hotmail.com or IM with me on Y!Messenger [ I am usually online from 9 pm to 5 am India time all night ]. my ID there is :  fizanaqsh . Add my ID to ur contacts so we can talk back and forth on physics and metaphysical questions bothering u and/ or me !  I have a Skype ID also and its : homeworknetguru.\ndo take the trouble of replying if my answer satisfies ur curiosity or not. i am v. much interested in these questions. look out for my answer 2 the third part of ur question re the "arrow of time"
848466
I would do it using the conservation of momentum laws. The momenum initially (before decay) is 224u*454m/s=101696u kgm/s\nMomentum can't dissapear so we must have this on the other side of the reaction.\nafter decay we have 222u*343m/s and 2u*[unknown speed]\nthat's 75924u kgm/s+2u*[unknown speed]\nI get the velocity of the alpha particle as 32877.5m/s\nIt's worth mentioning that this is the classical treatment of the problem, the low speed (relative to the speed of light) means that this treatment is justified. If it were a significant fraction of c we would need a relativistic treatment. But it's not so we're all good.\nHope this helps.\ngood lucl
478673
Looks like a controversy here....but no, gravity does not travel faster than light, it would take eight minutes before the earth's orbit changed.\n\n(If gravity was instantaneous, then it would be possible to use that to send messages faster than light!)
563154
There are things that can move faster than the speed of light, but they can't carry information faster than the speeed of light.  For example if you shine a spotlight on a distant mountain and then spin the light around so that the spot moves really fast you can easily get a situation where that spot of light goes faster than the speed of light.\n\nBut I think you were referring to particles that move faster than light maybe?  It was conjectured that a particle called a "tachyon" could go faster than light.  But these particles have never been detected, although serious efforts have been made to do so.  \n\nIn the real world if you keep adding energy to a particle, its speed will keep increasing, but it can never hit the speed of light.  Then again, maybe there can be some mechanism whereby matter could be made to "jump" to a speed higher than the speed of light without ever going *at* the speed of light?  I think nobody knows a way to do this, and it may also be impossible.  New physics would need to be discovered!
582923
No, only charged particles radiate photons when moving through a medium with a speed larger than the lightspeed of that medium. \n\nNeutron detection can be done with scintillator counters. What is detected is the signal of recoiling protons in the material, hit by the neutron.
366136
Not really - As it would travel at the speed of light (or the lack of) - but there would be a delay of a few picoseconds.....
18392
According to the lorentz transformation the space time coordinate of two inertial reference frame moving at a relative speed v along x axis is\nx'=(x-v*t)/L\ny'=y \nz'=z\nt'=(t-v*x/c^2)\nwhere L is lorentz factor=sqrt(1/(1-v^2/c^2));\n\nThe tricky thhing is this if any object moves faster than light the L of above equation will become imaginary.\nSo for an observer the proper time t' and the relativistic mass m=Lm0 becomes imaginary...\n Thus it cannot be faster than light.\nHowever theoritically there exist tachyon particles which moves in superluminal(faster than light)  velocity with imaginary proper time.\n But those crazy physix!!!
778881
yes\n\nlet:\nMo = resting mass\nc = speed of light\nv = current speed\nsqrt = square root\n\nThen M (moving mass) = Mo/sqrt(1-v^2/c^2) = L*Mo\n\nL is the Lorentz Factor = 1/sqrt(1-v^2/c^2)\n\nM, the moving mass is called the relativistic mass\n\nNote the energy to move is E = L*Mo*c^2 so as v approaches c the Lorentz factor goes to infinity and so does E. Most people write E = Mc^2 but this M is equal to L*Mo\n\nAlso note that when you move (even at slow speeds) your mass goes up just a small fraction.\n\nThis leads us to the reusable nuclear bomb. Assume you make a nuclear bomb with not enough material (less than critcal mass), you put this bomb on a very fast plane. For the people on the plane the mass does not change so it never has critical mass, however, to observer on the ground (who sees the plane moving) the mass increases and goes over critical mass. So those people on the plane when they detonate the bomb it does not complete the reaction but to those on the ground it does. Think about the possibility...
12211
Velocity distorts time.  The faster you go, the slower time goes for you.  This effect is negligable unless you are going very close to the speed of light.  In fact the formula is:\nt'=t/sqrt(1-v^2/c^2\nwhere t' is the time that has passed from a stationary observer, t is the time that has passed for you, sqrt means square root and ^2 means squared.  As you can notice, when v is small, since c^2 is so huge, you get a miniscule decimal, and 1 minus that number is basically as small as 1.0000000000001 or something, and so time is not really affected.  As v gets larger(it can never be the speed of light, then the denomonator would be zero) that fraction becomes closer to 1, so when you subtract it from one, the denomonator gets smaller and smaller, meaning t gets smaller(in order for t' to remain constant) this means that time slows down for the object moving at such velocities!  This formula is correct, it is part of Einstein's theory of relativity, and I have had to derive it myself from ordinary mechanics formulas.  \n\nAccording to the same factor, length also contracts.  It has been observed in certain tiny particles coming to the earth's surface.  These particles have a certain lifespan before they become unstable and decay.  They are also moving at a certain speed. (which is very fast; close to the speed of light.) You should simply be able to calculate v=d/t (velocity=distance/time) to find out how far they would travel.  However, they somehow travel farther than that.  When this calculated distance is put into that formula, we come up with the correct distance they actually travel!
361317
Both could be entirely possible in theory. However the only problem comes in how to accellerate to above the speed of light, which according to Einstein is necessary to travel in time. Ont theory is to get to the highest speed possible and slingshot in a planet or stars gravitational rotation and use that to accelerate faster while using a rotational acceleration thereby accelerating to the poroper speed for it. That's sound as well, but it's hard to get funding for stuff like that and it's dangerous, because much like Back to the future and Star Trek, only nuclear fuel would provide the power necessary without adding too much weight to the vessel, and will not deplete for the radiation off a nuclear reation last for several thousand year depending on the element used.
504085
no since the photons are mass-less, they have no inertia.\n\nand BTW Quantum mechanics and QCD as well as QED, have nothing to do with oscillations, they deal strictly with the emission and absorption of subatomic particles, it is String theory that deals with Oscillations.
592909
It is a real effect and can be important in particle accelerators where subatomic particles are going close to the speed of light. It turns out that the radioactive particles decay slower when they are moving at these high speeds. So it doesn't just appear that time slows down, it really does.\n\nThis is a consequence of special relativity where there are two basic assumptions:\n1) All motion is relative...you can't tell whether you are moving or everyone else is.\n2) The speed of light is the same to everyone.\n\nThe first assumption was true for classical mechanics, but the second was not and is what makes all the strange results of relativity. In some sense, it turns out that someone moving with respect to you has time and space 'rotated' with respect to each other. This makes both space and time measurements different for you and them. Two events that you see as being at the same time or place won't be for them. Two events they see as being at the same time or place won't be for you. The slowing of time is an effect that only applies to events that either you or they see as being in the same place (or very close by). Otherwise more complicated computations have to be done to determine how each sees things. Look up Lorentz transformations.
399905
We've actually run experiments that EXCEEDED the speed of light - which means the observer detected a particle before it left the emitter.  Wish I still had the link to give you.\n\nWeird science.  But real.
217138
the particles move faster.