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Petrified Wood In Days, Not Millions Of Years
prostoalex writes "Any petrified wood enthusiast would tell you that a quality product takes millions of years to mature, following Mother Nature's course, which, of course, is very frustrating for anyone experimenting. Pacific Northwest National Laboratory now managed to get the process in few days, USA Today says. The scientific achievement will be beneficial for "separating industrial chemicals, filtering pollutants and soaking up contamination"."
If you want more on the specifics of carbon dating, check the Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_dating
As far as accelerating radioactive decay, there is some interesting research out there about bombarding fission products with accelerated particles and causing a several-fold reduction in decay times. A former ASU nuclear physics professor envisioned one method for it:
http://members.cox.net/theroyprocess/
A note of caution: The "Roy Process" web site is run by the former professor's "Agent" so its slanted more for sales than education.
Well, you could take a sample of naturally occurring carbon and separate its isotopes.
No need for that. Just grab some mined coal. That stuff has been underground for a number of million years and has no C-14 left in it.
From the posts here, I guess it's not so well-known, but radiocarbon dating is pretty much useless for the modern era for exactly this reason: We've been burning so many fossil fuels that we've screwed up the natural ratio of carbon isotopes in the atmosphere.
1. You didn't reference the verse, or the version correctly! It's verse 19, and KJV.
2. More contemporary versions accurately use the pronoun 'they' where you've quoted 'he.'
3. In the KJV, if it really meant God, it would have said He, not he.
But you a) don't care, and b) just wanted to sound smart, didn't you?
For future reference, the Bible can be found on line in many translations, searchable at http://bible.gospelcom.net/
But Herr Heisenberg, how does the electron know when I'm looking?
Yes, they exist - and your favourite hobbies might appear as totally bizarre to them (amongst others) as to you. Some petrified wood is opalescent and quite beautiful when polished up. I'm not specifically a fan of it, but dear old Dad is a rock-hound and has some breath-taking pieces in his collection.
Got time? Spend some of it coding or testing
You just need to get the desired ration of C-14 into the food chain. With mice you can feed them on yeast or algae pills made, at least partially, in an artificial environment. With a pine tree however, you'd have to operate a sealed 20m - 30m tall environmental chamber for 30 to 40 years with the special C-14 rich atmosphere the whole time.
Obviously you'd need a shorter time if you're wanting a smaller tree or smaller wooden object. Ten years ought to give you a tree more than large enough for a spork, be it 200 000 years old or 2 million.
Beta is broken and the link to classic doesn't work. Stop wasting our time or there won't be anybody left here.
I'm still waiting for my fake/real diamonds! $5 a carrat my ASS!
There are people working very hard on this. I think the show Nova did on creating diamond synthetics is one of their best.
DeBeers purposely hoardes diamonds to keep the price up ala OPEC. In fact, none of their executives can step foot inside the US as they would likely be arrested.
Sadly, the Bush administration may let them off the hook on this.
Only if there is honest and real competition in the diamond market (even with the synthetics) will you see $5/carat diamonds As it stands now, many of the synthetics seem to cost as much as the real.
Full Text in Advanced Materials
I love that you can always find the USA today equivalent on slashdot, but never anything more in depth, doesnt this site cater to nerds?
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