What Happens When Electrons Are Forced Into Protons?
Sleep On Physics
114,712 views
What happens when you force an electron into a proton? Not what you'd expect. The electron doesn't just merge with the proton, it transforms it. Through the weak nuclear force, the proton changes identity entirely, becoming a neutron while releasing a ghostly neutrino that can pass through an entire planet without touching a single atom.
This process, called electron capture, is one of the most fundamental transformations in particle physics. Under normal conditions, it barely happens. But inside the collapsing core of a dying massive star, where densities reach beyond nuclear levels, it becomes unstoppable. Trillions upon trillions of protons are converted into neutrons in less than a second, releasing a flood of neutrinos carrying more energy than hundreds of suns will produce in their entire lifetimes.
In this video, we explore the weak interaction at the quark level, electron degeneracy pressure and the Chandrasekhar limit, the runaway collapse of an iron core, the historic detection of neutrinos from Supernova 1987A, and the bizarre internal structure of neutron stars, from nuclear pasta to neutron superfluids.
Sources:
Shapiro, S. L. and Teukolsky, S. A. (1983). Black Holes, White Dwarfs, and Neutron Stars: The Physics of Compact Objects. John Wiley and Sons. https://doi.org/10.1002/9783527617661
Lattimer, J. M. and Prakash, M. (2004). The Physics of Neutron Stars. Science, 304(5670), 536-542. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.1090720
Burrows, A. (2013). Colloquium: Perspectives on Core-Collapse Supernova Theory. Reviews of Modern Physics, 85(1), 245-261. https://doi.org/10.1103/RevModPhys.85...
Hirata, K. et al. (1987). Observation of a Neutrino Burst from the Supernova SN1987A. Physical Review Letters, 58(14), 1490-1493. https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.5...
Griffiths, D. (2008). Introduction to Elementary Particle Physics (2nd Edition). John Wiley and Sons. https://doi.org/10.1002/9783527618460
#ElectronCapture #NeutronStars #ParticlePhysics #WeakForce #Supernova #Neutrinos #Astrophysics
20 Comments
1) what happens to neutrinos that cross the event horizon of a black hole?
2) what happens to the neutrinos that try to escape the known universe?
3) how does any of this explain B+ (Beta plus) decay?
But what he conceived as the smallest possible thing you could arrive at by division was not necessarily what we have subsequently (in modern physics) defined as the atom. There is no reason to believe that the proton/neutron/electron/gluon etc. entity is what he was conceiving. He meant, by definition, the smallest thing you could get to, i.e. that which is indivisible. As the atom of physics is, in a sense, divisible, he didn't mean that. His was a thought experiment, not a description of a particle we later discovered which was then, at some later time, found to be composite, comprising subatomic particles, quarks or whatever. Democritus had no idea about the actual positive, negative and neutral particles within an atom. His thought experiment was entirely valid. It may turn out in time that we agree that the smallest thing is a "string" of some kind. And that would be, philosophically, what Democritus was referring to as an atom ... that which cannot be divided.
Which were discovered by
Dr. Sheldon Cooper
What Happens When Electrons Are Forced Into Protons?
Sleep On Physics
114,712 views
What happens when you force an electron into a proton? Not what you'd expect. The electron doesn't just merge with the proton, it transforms it. Through the weak nuclear force, the proton changes identity entirely, becoming a neutron while releasing a ghostly neutrino that can pass through an entire planet without touching a single atom.
This process, called electron capture, is one of the most fundamental transformations in particle physics. Under normal conditions, it barely happens. But inside the collapsing core of a dying massive star, where densities reach beyond nuclear levels, it becomes unstoppable. Trillions upon trillions of protons are converted into neutrons in less than a second, releasing a flood of neutrinos carrying more energy than hundreds of suns will produce in their entire lifetimes.
In this video, we explore the weak interaction at the quark level, electron degeneracy pressure and the Chandrasekhar limit, the runaway collapse of an iron core, the historic detection of neutrinos from Supernova 1987A, and the bizarre internal structure of neutron stars, from nuclear pasta to neutron superfluids.
Sources:
Shapiro, S. L. and Teukolsky, S. A. (1983). Black Holes, White Dwarfs, and Neutron Stars: The Physics of Compact Objects. John Wiley and Sons. https://doi.org/10.1002/9783527617661
Lattimer, J. M. and Prakash, M. (2004). The Physics of Neutron Stars. Science, 304(5670), 536-542. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.1090720
Burrows, A. (2013). Colloquium: Perspectives on Core-Collapse Supernova Theory. Reviews of Modern Physics, 85(1), 245-261. https://doi.org/10.1103/RevModPhys.85...
Hirata, K. et al. (1987). Observation of a Neutrino Burst from the Supernova SN1987A. Physical Review Letters, 58(14), 1490-1493. https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.5...
Griffiths, D. (2008). Introduction to Elementary Particle Physics (2nd Edition). John Wiley and Sons. https://doi.org/10.1002/9783527618460
#ElectronCapture #NeutronStars #ParticlePhysics #WeakForce #Supernova #Neutrinos #Astrophysics