Scientists have made a major step towards building the world’s first practical nuclear clock.In a study published today in Nature, the team demonstrate a completely new way of probing the tiny “ticking” of the thorium-229 nucleus without needing a specialised transparent crystal – a breakthrough that could underpin a new class of timekee...
  • eleitl@lemmy.zip
    1·
    2 days ago

    Th-229 has has a half life of 7916 years, so has to be made artificially. The process is based on irradiating natural thorium with neutrons to breed significant amounts of U-233, then allowing it to decay for some time and chemically separate out resulting Th-229.