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bobie
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What is the force that makes a neutron eject an electron, and how strong is it?
bobie said:What is the force that makes a neutron eject an electron, and how strong is it?
The neutrino is (nearly always) very close to the speed of light, the electron can be everything from "very slow" to a significant fraction of the speed of light.What is the speed of the extranged electron and neutrino?
That can happen in some isotopes (it is a rare process, however). The electron is destroyed in the process.when I said captured i was referring to the formation of a neutron: in a nucleus a proton captures an electron forming a neutron , is that wrong?
No, there is no "electron in a proton".You say the electron is created in the process, but an electron ought to be already in a proton so that it can have no charge, is that wrong too?
bobie said:Thanks,
when I said captured i was referring to the formation of a neutron: in a nucleus a proton captures an electron forming a neutron , is that wrong?
If a neutron is freed from the nucleus it decays into a proton emitting the electron plus a neutrino.
You say the electron is created in the process, but an electron ought to be already in a proton so that it can have no charge, is that wrong too?
bobie said:when I said captured i was referring to the formation of a neutron: in a nucleus a proton captures an electron forming a neutron , is that wrong?
That depends on the nucleus. Helium-6, for example, decays to Li-6 with a half-life of less than a second.tiny-tim said:(inside a nucleus, a neutron is much more stable)
bobie said:If there is no negative particle insaide a neutron, how come it has no positive charge?
Even if the electron is created in the process, once it comes to exist it is attracted by the proton by the Coulombs law, and there is no other interaction between them, right?...now, how come they acquire different speeds?mfb said:the electron can be everything from "very slow" to a significant fraction of the speed of light.
And so there is no positron in a proton an up-quark is equivalent to a positron?jtbell said:There are no electrons inside a neutron. It's well established that a neutron is made up of an up quark (charge +2/3e) and two down quarks (each with charge -1/3e), which have a total charge of zero. In beta decay, a down quark converts to an up quark and an electron and antineutrino are created.
bobie said:.. as soon as a neutron is free the process of decay starts creating an electron and a neutrino …
… these two interact and the neutrino expels the electron? ...and who expels the neutrino at the speed of light? the electron?
That is what I do not understand: wiki says that weak force is an interactions between leptons, and here we have only one electron and a neutrino, if they do not interact where is the weak force? who starts the process of decay?.tiny-tim said:after they are both created together, they have nothing to do wiht each other (the neutrino goes away at almost the speed of light anyway)
(and the electron manages to escape from the proton because the electron is created with a lot of energy and momentum)
bobie said:That is what I do not understand: wiki says that weak force is an interactions between leptons, and here we have only one electron and a neutrino, if they do not interact where is the weak force? who starts the process of decay?.
Zapper says the down quark is changed to an up quark via the weak force, is it an interaction between quarks?
I am sorry if I cannot make myself clear, but I was commenting tiny-tim's ".. electron and neutrino have nothing to do with each other".ZapperZ said:Er... Hello? Electrons and neutrinos are BOTH LEPTONS. so what is the problem here?
There is no electron inside a proton just as there is no butterfly inside of a caterpillar. The Neutron transforms into a electron + proton + anti-neutrino.bobie said:If there is no negative particle insaide a neutron, how come it has no positive charge?
If a neutron decays into a proton and an electron , what prevents you from saying that a neutron is made up by a proton and an electron?
How can an electron be created in the process without a positron being created too?
Thanks for your patience!
bobie said:That is what I do not understand: wiki says that weak force is an interactions between leptons
who starts the process of decay?
... and what gives the neutrino the huge KE and direction?
bobie said:And so there is no positron in a proton an up-quark is equivalent to a positron?
bobie said:… an electron is created by pair production: electron- positron.
Now, how can you create a pair electron-antineutrino? it has no charge and its mass is billions of billions time smaller than the electron's, it's extremely unbalanced!
bobie said:Thanks, you have been very helpful,
what baffles me is the fact that an electron is created by pair production: electron- positron.
Now, how can you create a pair electron-antineutrino? it has no charge and its mass is billions of billions time smaller than the electron's, it's extremely unbalanced!
bobie said:Thank you all for your help,
now allow me a last, stupid, question, what prevents you from saying that a neutron is made up by a proton and an electron stuck together and then, when the neutron is free, the electron is emitted along with a neutrino, leaving a regular proton?
Angular momentum. The neutron, proton and electron all have spin 1/2. You cannot make a spin 1/2 neutron by joining together two spin 1/2 particles.bobie said:Thank you all for your help,
now allow me a last, stupid, question, what prevents you from saying that a neutron is made up by a proton and an electron stuck together and then, when the neutron is free, the electron is emitted along with a neutrino, leaving a regular proton?
The process of electron ejection by a neutron is called beta decay.
A neutron can eject an electron due to the instability of the nucleus, which may be caused by an excess of neutrons or a high neutron-to-proton ratio.
Yes, a neutron can spontaneously eject an electron through beta decay.
The ejection of an electron changes the neutron into a proton, resulting in a change in the atomic number of the atom.
The weak nuclear force is responsible for the transformation of a neutron into a proton and the ejection of an electron in beta decay.