What is a muon anyway?

[birdguy 3,943]

A friend attached this to an e-mail I got this morning.
https://taskandpurpose.com/news/navy-muon-navigation-arctic-circle/

I'm beginning to feel like I'm on an alien world whose technology and society I don't understand.

I'm drifting away trying hard to remember a world as I once knew it. 

Noel
 

[Mace 1,922]

11 minutes ago, birdguy said:

A friend attached this to an e-mail I got this morning.
https://taskandpurpose.com/news/navy-muon-navigation-arctic-circle/

I'm beginning to feel like I'm on an alien world whose technology and society I don't understand.

I'm drifting away trying hard to remember a world as I once knew it. 

Noel
 

Don't worry, it's as alien to me as it is to you, and I'm still in my 40's but pushing towards 50.

Out in the hinterlands where I come from, "muon" is how they pronounce "moron", so I would say a "muon" is a person lacking intelligence.

[Paladin 101]

I believe it is a "particle" similar to an electron.  BR

M.

[Reader 2,021]

The article says
 

Quote

Muons are one of the fundamental subatomic particles, kind of like electrons but much heavier,

 

[qqwertz 781]

15 minutes ago, Paladin said:

I believe it is a "particle" similar to an electron.  BR

M.

Yes, it's basically the same as an electron, just heavier. The main difference is that muons can decay into an electron (plus two other particles, but let's not get into details): since it has more mass M, it has more energy E = M c^2. A free muon therefore can release some of the energy to turn into an electron, but the opposite cannot happen for a free electron (it doesn't have enough energy). Luckily for us, since our world wouldn't exist if electrons were unstable.

Peter

[birdguy 3,943]

http://www.hep.vanderbilt.edu/~gabellwe/qnweb/qnpptr/What_is_a_Muon.pdf

I can almost understand this.

A muon has half life many times shorter than an electron.

So say an electron is the earth revolving around a proton called the sun.  And the solar system is an atom which along with a bunch of other atoms (solar systems) make up a molecule called the Milk Way.  Now the molecule we call the Milky Way with all the other molecules or galaxies in the universe make up the tip of a match in a matchbox on top of a kitchen stove on a world in a universe much, much larger than our universe.

So we humans with much shorter half lives than the electron we call Earth are muons.

The only question that remains is how far down in the matchbox is the match the head of which is our universe?

Noel

 

[qqwertz 781]

9 minutes ago, birdguy said:

http://www.hep.vanderbilt.edu/~gabellwe/qnweb/qnpptr/What_is_a_Muon.pdf

I can almost understand this.

A muon has half life many times shorter than an electron.

Not quite. The electron is stable, it does not decay at all. The link you provided compares the decay time of muons (less than a microsecond) to the decay of atomic nuclei. The latter ranges from a much shorter time than the muon decay time so millions of years. A better comparison would be the decay time of other elementary particles. Compared to those, the muon actually lives quite long (since it can only decay through the electroweak force, as opposed to the strong nuclear force). Many particles only live about a billionths of the lifetime of the muon 🙂  

[birdguy 3,943]

 

6 minutes ago, qqwertzde said:

Not quite. The electron is stable, it does not decay at all. The link you provided compares the decay time of muons (less than a microsecond) to the decay of atomic nuclei. The latter ranges from a much shorter time than the muon decay time so millions of years. A better comparison would be the decay time of other elementary particles. Compared to those, the muon actually lives quite long (since it can only decay through the electroweak force, as opposed to the strong nuclear force). Many particles only live about a billionths of the lifetime of the muon

I guess that show how much I don't know about this stuff.

Noel

[qqwertz 781]

1 hour ago, birdguy said:

I guess that show how much I don't know about this stuff.

Don't worry too much about that, Noel. It's my job to know that 😉

Peter

[birdguy 3,943]

I'm surrounded here by so many smart people like you and Doug and Martin I'm beginning to get and inferiority complex.

Noel

[sightseer 895]

6 hours ago, qqwertzde said:

Compared to those, the muon actually lives quite long (since it can only decay through the electroweak force, as opposed to the strong nuclear force). Many particles only live about a billionths of the lifetime of the muon

OK so --  I was going to ask "How long would a muon say a muon's half life is" but maybe thats irrelevant -- as its all relative I guess?

EDIT:  The latest I hear about gravity is that it may actually be caused by time flowing at different rates (my understanding).  It flows slower as you get closer to any massive object so as you walk down the street, your head is actually travelling faster through time than your feet are.  But what does this do to the equation (d/t)/t?

acceleration due to gravity has time in it (at least my equations do).  its mind bending. it really is.  If time flows at different rates in different places then what are we to say?  t1 per unit time versus t2 per unit time?

 

Edited November 30, 2021 by sightseer

[qqwertz 781]

32 minutes ago, sightseer said:

OK so --  I was going to ask "How long would a muon say a muon's half life is" but maybe thats irrelevant -- as its all relative I guess?

EDIT:  The latest I hear about gravity is that it may actually be caused by time flowing at different rates....

Oh, you're opening a big can of worms there 🙂

Yes, time is relative. From the perspective of  the muon itself (its own watch, so-to-speak), it will decay in a microsecond. However, if it is moving very fast from the perspective of a person, the muon may live much longer as measured on the person's watch. The muons we detect on Earth are generated in the upper atmosphere ( > 10km) and are moving close to the speed of light. Within a microsecond, they would only be able to cover a few hundred meters, but in our time they live sufficiently long to reach the Earth's surface.

Gravity does not play a big role for these muons. Yes, clocks go slower closer to a massive object, but it is a small effect, only a few nanoseconds every day for satellites. However, for high-precision systems like the GPS network, you need to take that into account, otherwise GPS location would become unreliable within a few days.

Peter

[W2DR 1,860]

6 hours ago, birdguy said:

The only question that remains is how far down in the matchbox is the match the head of which is our universe?

23.4666778  parsecs.

[W2DR 1,860]

4 hours ago, birdguy said:

I'm surrounded here by so many smart people like you and Doug and Martin I'm beginning to get and inferiority complex.

Noel

It's not a matter of "smart" Noel. It's just a matter of exposure. All people are exposed to different things during their lifetime. I don't know if that's a matter of chance or choice (or both) but one's exposure to various "things" shapes our lives. Just because one person may "know" something that another person doesn't isn't my definition of "smart". It's our experiences in life that shape our being, not what we may have learned from books. No person on this earth is inferior to another.  We're all in this together and sharing what we "know" is a vital part of living with our fellow man. That said, I sure wish I was smart enough to take bird pictures like you do 🙂 .....Doug                          

[birdguy 3,943]

36 minutes ago, W2DR said:

That said, I sure wish I was smart enough to take bird pictures like you do 

It's what photographers call 'the eye' Doug.  How to compose a picture.  I think it's a talent you're born with.  I never took any classes in photography just as I never took any classes on how to write.  I was just lucky enough to be born with both.

But when I'm in a group that can speak intelligently about muons and photons and gravitons I just stand in awe.

Noel