The upper end of the EM spectrum is pretty cool - Discussion Forum

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The upper end of the EM spectrum is pretty cool

2009-01-30, 9:39 PM #1

Obi_Kwiet

It's Stuart, Martha Stuart

Posts: 7,943

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ultra-high-energy_cosmic_ray

Quote:

Cosmic rays with even higher energies have since been observed, among them the Oh-My-God particle ... Its observation was a shock to astrophysicists, who estimated its energy to be approximately 3 × 1020 electronvolts (50 joules)— in other words, a subatomic particle with macroscopic kinetic energy equal to that of a baseball thrown at 96 km/h (60 mph).

It was most probably a proton with a velocity only very slightly below the speed of light. To a static observer, such a proton, traveling at [1 − (5×10−24)] times c, would fall only 46 nanometers behind a photon after one year.

That's pretty darn cool.

2009-01-31, 1:49 PM #2

Zloc_Vergo

Zulenglashernbracker

Posts: 5,888

That's really cool.

I had a blog. It sucked.

2009-02-01, 6:12 AM #3

Obi_Kwiet

It's Stuart, Martha Stuart

Posts: 7,943

If that's subatomic particle, is that really part of the EM spectrum though?

2009-02-01, 6:19 AM #4

Ruthven

Not The Man He Once Was

Posts: 7,638

Particles act as waves, plank's equation or some sh*t, so the particle may act like like a photon with immense energy.

But yeah i thought cosmic rays were just very high energy gammas.

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