polonium halos

I see the area of uncertainty being wider as to the center of the band than the outer band. Why you guys can't see that; I don't know

Irrelevant even if true, and it's not. The centre of the band can be determined by visible features - the visible intensity variation. The visible "edge" is simply where the extent of the band can no longer be determined from the background signal in this particular photograph. Thus your edge is a function of the photographic image and the band, where-as the maximum is independent of the image.This is irrlevant, because it is the maximum that coincides with the theoretical penetration distances. The broadening of the band (into a gaussian) is caused by numerous effects, but primarily the none-point-like (extended) nature of the source. This should be obvious to anyone wanting to discuss this topic. If Gentry argued that the measurements should be to the outer-most *visibile* extent of the ring, then he better have a damn good explanation for why - claiming ease or "greater accuracy" is idiocy.

Mathematics, scientific integrity, honesty?Pick one or all.

---

Read not to contradict and confute, not to believe and take for granted, not to find talk and discourse, but to weigh and consider - Francis BaconThe more we understand particular things, the more we understand God - Spinoza

When one is guessing the edge of the color band, what one is actually doing is making a determination of ones ability to detect the color as having ended. Disregarding a propensity to second guess oneself "I think I see a tinge of red, but maybe I'm imagining it." it's still limited by ones color resolution.Going back to our colored ring: Say the ring has a comfortable circumference of 30 cm. Using a 1 cm wide window slide it along the band. At every point on the band the window will show more red at one extreme and more yellow at the other with two exceptions: when the window is centered over the Max Red or over the Max Yellow; there, both extremes will be equally orange. The 1 cm width for the window can be reduced to three times the width of ones color resolution with the same effect, reducing the problem to ones ability to resolve the center of ones window even beyond ones color resolution. (Reducing the width of the window to dw looks like there might be a calculus problem in there somewhere.)AbE: Speaking of resolution: this technicality needs to be resolved soon so the topic can resume pretty please.Edited by lyx2no, : Allowing me a return to lurkerhood.

---

Genesis 2
17 But of the ponderosa pine, thou shalt not eat of it; for in the day that thou shinniest thereof thou shalt sorely learn of thy nakedness.
18 And we all live happily ever after.

That does not matter because the edge of visibility will still be the same all around the ring. If you ever look at a bell curve, you will realize that the top is not a sharp point. It is a wide area which is relatively flat.Edited by Phydeaux, : No reason given.

What I am saying is that the determination doesn't really make that much of a difference compared to the thickness of the "maximum."Edited by Phydeaux, : No reason given.

I took you to mean: Which isn't contradicted by:But if what you meant was: then I stand corrected. Thanks for disillusioning me.Now I'm just confused.Ab2E: Hi cavediver. You've never seen a bell curve? I'd have thought you would have with all that math stuff you do.Edited by lyx2no, : FormatingEdited by lyx2no, : No reason given.

---

Genesis 2
17 But of the ponderosa pine, thou shalt not eat of it; for in the day that thou shinniest thereof thou shalt sorely learn of thy nakedness.
18 And we all live happily ever after.

The edge of visibility may well be the same all the way around - so what? How does that change the fact that the edge radius will be a function of the image reproduction Are you actually understanding anything that you are being told?

why do you think you are still posting??? - because you have come up with different results to RAZD's and my own - THAT is how much of a difference it is. And your attempts to measure are woeful. When the measurements are made with reasonable care, it is obvious that the radon circle is there. Funny how both you, Alphaomegakid before you, and Gentry at the beginning - all measure to the outside edge with complete disregard to the physics, just so you can all try to claim that the radon circle is not there. Now, let me think... are there are any pertinent idealogies that all three of you share that may want you all to believe that there is no radon ring??

I'm a fucking astrophysicst (on top of everything else) - do you want me to try and guess how many absorption/emission gaussian lines I've measured (not to mention photographed, extracted, resolved, fitted, etc) in my life? And here I am arguing with yet another cretin who thinks he knows what he's talking about.Your predecessor would never have doubted be so... I'm hurt, lyx2no, hurt I tell you Edited by cavediver, : No reason given.

I've a cruel-streak all my own. Ha-ha-ha (Does the look like an evil laugh to you? It doesn't look evil to me. Distinctly not evil.)

---

Genesis 2
17 But of the ponderosa pine, thou shalt not eat of it; for in the day that thou shinniest thereof thou shalt sorely learn of thy nakedness.
18 And we all live happily ever after.

Hi cavediver,
quick question: I've not been up on this thread since its start, have read a bunch of it and still have tons of questions.How does imprecisely measuring the position of the rings "remove" the Radon ring?Edited by CosmicChimp, : No reason given.

All I am saying is that the ring is more like this:
Click to enlargeYellow being the rock, red being the ring, and the orange being the part you claim is uncertain. So, in this case, which is more accurate; measuring the edge, or measuring the maximum point (point LOL) of coloration? If you can't see that the rings are like that in picture of the polonium halo that is all distorted which they like to measure, look at this one:The halo they are measuring has smaller rings, but the same problems.

I understand what you are saying. What is important is that the actual distance between the rings is measured, and that the center of the circles placed over it is the actual radio center. If you measure from the edge of the ring, it will be the same distance between them as the actual maximum of the actual polonium ring. Other wise, there is a wide area of uncertainty which can lead to the ridiculous idea that Gentry put a picture of a halo in his book which has evidence of a radon ring.Edited by Phydeaux, : No reason given.

Hi Phydeaux,I've finally got some down-time to use answeringyour several question on this thread. Message 236
(1) because this particular picture does show the same kind of distinction visible on the 235U halo for distinction between 222Rn and 210Po (see the yellow boxes):: (2) because it is one of the few halos in Flourite, the same crystal as the 235U halo where we can distinguish between the 222Rn and 210Po rings, and(3) the rings are different diameters in different cyrstals, so to compare it to the 235U rings, we must use a halo in Flourite.(4) the rings in Flourite are larger than the ones in Biotite, so there is better ability to measure small differences. We can match the rings to the published data, and then adjust the scale of the picture until we get a good fit for all rings on the 235U halo.Once we have done this, then we look to matching the polonium halo in the same manner for the two outer rings - rings that are not disputed - and see what we see for the inner rings.We start with the 238U decay chain: Then we select only the α decay events on the main decay sequence, and sort them from small to large, and add the radius data from Schilling (S) and Gentry (G) to derive a valid average value for each isotope: From this we can draw theoretical circles to exactly match the published data: This shows the α energy on the right, the halo radii on the left. I've also shown the curve of correlation between these values on the right, and I note that this is not a smooth curve, so there are irregularities in the data, but I've used this to project radii for 230Th and 234U inside the 226Ra circle.The next stage is to find the center of the halo and the scale of the pictures. To do this I used the simple approach that three points on the circumference define a circle, so I established 3 points on the 218Po ring, drew my circle through them and then scaled them, the circle and the picture so that the radius of the circle was 23.5. These are shown in green on the picture, while the red circles are the other α decay rings for 238U in Flourite.Here is the 238U Halo: Here is the 222Rn Halo: There is no question that there is damage visible outside the 210Po circle, and that some of the visible damage is outside the 222Rn circle. This should not be the case if there were no 222Rn in the halo.However, just to be sure I rescaled the picture by 19.4/20.0 - half the distance between the 210Po and the 222Rn circles, so that you could argue that it was all 210Po with no 222Rn -- except that the two outer circles BOTH miss the halo rings for these isotopes: The 218Po halo scales at 22.8 μm not 23.5 μm and the 214Po halo scales at 33.5 μm instead of 34.6 μm, and this clearly is NOT a match to the rings in the picture, so the inner rings cannot be forced to eliminate 222Rn from being in the picture without also missing the two outer rings.To conclude: the picture originally has the appearance of two rings at the locations for 210Po and 222Rn, and when the rings are measured, the results accurately measure the outer rings at 34.6 μm for the 214Po ring and 23.5 μm for the 218Po ring, and there is visible damage beyond the 222Rn circle at 20.5 μm, while in the visible gap areas of the picture, the inner damage lines up with the 210Po circle.Enjoy.Edited by RAZD, : minor correction: I used 19.4 rather than 19.5 for 210Po as that is the average value between Schindler and Gentry for this ring.

---

we are limited in our ability to understand
by our ability to understand
Rebel American Zen Deist
... to learn ... to think ... to live ... to laugh ...
to share.

---

• • • Join the effort to solve medical problems, AIDS/HIV, Cancer and more with Team EvC! (click) • • •