Natural Science Forum / Physics / Research / March 2006

I'm reading the Scientific American article on the Oklo reactor.
One of the statements is that U237 was produced, and that this
decays (after some time, and through some steps) to Bismuth.
What reaction produces U237 in a nuclear reactor?

An isolated electron in a magnetostatic field experiences a torque of
magnitude, T = mu x B, which results in precession of the electron's
spin/magnetic axis.  It has just one minimum energy state that is
defined by T = 0, mu . B > 0.  When in this state there is no lower

I've read several times that in the Schrodinger eq., if there are
multiple # of spatial derivatives of the wave function then this leads
to the wave function being non-local.
How does this happen?

Dear Members,
There are different formalisms of Quantum Mechanics,
such as S-Matrix, C*-algebra, path-intergarl approach,
and wigner-Jordan's algebraic approach. Can anyone

First question: What would happen if a nucleus was bombarded with gamma
rays?
Second question: Why are nuclei of atoms with even mass number more
stable than nuclei with odd mass number?

Questions on the Kerr metric cont'n
relates to postings done in the thread
"Questions on the Kerr metric" dated
Jan 7 2003, by Ken S. Tucker...

The cosmological constant has a value given, in suitable
units, by the surface of the horizon. Several people believe
that this equality is the case not only at present, but
that it has fundamental reasons and has always been the case.

Also available at http://math.ucr.edu/home/baez/week228.html
March 18, 2006
This Week's Finds in Mathematical Physics (Week 228)
John Baez

What you would consider as the most suitable undergraduate
programme/route (in UK) for studies in cosmology?
A physics degree, a mathematics degree or a more cosmology-oriented one
like Lanchaster's Uni. "Astrophysics and cosmology"

Have they ever retried to recreate the heavier elements, such as
element 118? I have heard no news since they retracted the statement
that they had created element 118. I looked in the wiki for Ununoctium
but the last thing it says is that they retracted it.

"The Dirac Equation in Maxwell Form"
is now in the article list under http://federation.g3z.com/Physics
Several years ago, in the 1990's, there had been a few papers published
in the Foundations of Physics and elsewhere which purported to

I don't understand: On the one hand with special relativity Einstein
got rid of the aether - the medium which electromagnetic waves use to
travel and which can be used as an absolute reference system. On the
other hand in quantum field theory quantum fields are invented which

It's taken me a long time, but I've finally written up what I think
about the radiation reaction force on charged particles, the
equivalence principle, and all that.  This is largely a response to
some posts by Stephen Parrott a while back.

Dear Members;
According to one of the principles of QM, measurable
properties of physical systems (observables) are
represented by Hermitian operators. Is this a

If one substitute psi = ro*exp(iS/hba) into Schrodinger equation, one
would find the continuation equation and the quantum Hamioton-Jacobi
equation with an additional "quantum potential" to the classical
counterpart (which is the linchpin of the Bohmian interpretation).