For the first time ever, physicists have spotted rare, ghostly particles produced by a weird kind of fusion inside the sun. The particles, called CNO-produced neutrinos, traveled from the sun to a detector buried deep beneath a mountain in Italy. This discovery brings humans one step closer to understanding the fiery nuclear reactions fueling our home star
Por: Diane Lincoln, Live Science. Acesse aqui a matéria original.
Two types of nuclear fusion reactions occur in the sun's core. The first, and most common, is proton-proton fusion, where protons fuse to transform hydrogen into helium. (...) Rarely, nuclear fusion occurs via a six-step process, called the CNO cycle, where hydrogen is fused to helium using carbon (C), nitrogen (N), and oxygen (O). Proton-proton fusion and the CNO-cycle create different types of neutrinos, subatomic particles that are nearly massless and can pass through ordinary matter without a hint of their presence, at least most of the time. Physicists routinely detect neutrinos created during the proton-proton process. However, on June 23, at the Neutrino 2020 Virtual Meeting, researchers from Italy's Borexino detector announced that they had detected CNO-produced solar neutrinos for the very first time. Saiba mais...
Imagem: NASA Goddard Space Flight Center/ SDO
