Naked Science Forum

Non Life Sciences => Physics, Astronomy & Cosmology => Topic started by: Salih on 12/04/2009 12:30:02

Title: What is the lifetime of fundamental particles?
Post by: Salih on 12/04/2009 12:30:02

Salih asked the Naked Scientists:
                 
Dear  Dr.Smith,
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Very small free roaming particles lifetime   very short.[free photons, free neutron, free proton, free electron]. And their lifetime is its energy Mc2. Protons are observed to be stable and their theoretical minimum half-life is 1x10'36 years.Grand unified theories generally predict. That proton decay should take place, although experiments so far have only resulted in a lower limit 10'35 years for proton's lifetime.  I see that. The earth lifetime is its Mc^2 energy.  When this is calculated
the lifetime of earth:
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Earth Mass= 5.97x10'24 kg. The lifetime 1 kg of  mass in space  is 2851927903,26 years.
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Earth Lifetime is 1.7x10'34 years. I think that, this is a very interesting result.
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Best regarts
Salih KÄrcalar

What do you think?

Title: What is the lifetime of fundamental particles?
Post by: Vern on 12/04/2009 16:07:19

Maybe I missed something in my studies, but I haven't seen the equation E = MC² related to particle life times. A neutron outside a nucleus has a half-life of a few minutes. Theoretical particles such as quarks and gluon's have a life time outside a nucleus that is too short to observe, leading to speculation that they might not exist. At least we know they don't exist outside a nucleus.

Title: What is the lifetime of fundamental particles?
Post by: Kryptid on 14/04/2009 06:21:05

Photons and electrons are stable. They do not decay.

Title: What is the lifetime of fundamental particles?
Post by: Vern on 14/04/2009 13:22:04

Quote from: Supercryptid on 14/04/2009 06:21:05

Photons and electrons are stable. They do not decay.

And it seems that protons also do not decay. However in theory, they may have an enormously long half life of many billions of years.