A fresh look at Shnoll effect

Thanks for Ed Oberg for sending an email in which he mentioned Shnoll effect. I have discussed the Shnoll effect from the TGD point of view at here. Now I must say that the number theoretical ideas look a little bit too formal an approach when one wants to understand the splitting of the distribution for the number of counts per time interval in say alpha decays. A more direct connection with physics would be badly needed. Therefore I decided to take a fresh look on Shnoll effect with inspiration coming from the increase of the understanding of quantum gravitation in the TGD framework (see for instance this and this).

Consider first the Shnoll effect.

1. For instance, alpha decay rates are studied: overall decay rates or in fixed direction for alpha rays. Number of counts per time interval τ varies. Poisson distribution becomes many-peaked.
2. Is there a dependence on the period tau? How many peaks? Are the numbers of peaks the same for various values of tau? The natural assumption is that there are several rates. If so, the number N for peak I is N= rate(I)×τ.
3. There are periodicities of the peak structure related to sidereal time and solar time. There are correlations with the dynamics of the Sun, Earth, and even galaxy. There is also a dependence on the direction of the alpha ray.
4. The splitting of the decay rates as the emergence of almost degenerate states of nuclei would be the simplest explanation. The astrophysical correlations suggest that this should be due to the gravitational effects.

The recent TGD view of quantum gravitation could provide a simple explanation.

1. A splitting of the state of the emitting nucleus to N states occurs such that the N states have different decay rates. Where does this degeneracy come from? Could the degenerate states be dark variants of the ordinary nucleus in the TGD sense and therefore have different values of h_eff. The gravitational Planck constants ℏ_gr for astrophysical objects are suggested by the observed astrophysical correlations.
2. Why would these almost degenerate states of nuclei have different alpha decay rates? These rates are determined by nuclear physics. In the TGD framework, the only variable parameter is effective Planck h_eff which affects the rates in higher order in perturbation expansion. Lowest order is not affected. In higher orders the effect is non-trivial and could be large for strong interactions.
3. The quantum gravitational effects characterized by ℏ_gr are expected to be the largest ones. Could the almost degenerate nuclei be attached to gravitational flux tubes of different astrophysical objects and have different effective/gravitational Planck constants? Sun, Earth, Moon, galaxy, and planest come first in mind.
4. This model applies also to electromagnetic interactions and could explain the Shnoll effect in chemistry. The basic prediction is that the splitting of the Poisson distribution is qualitatively similar independent of the system studied.

See the article A Possible Explanation of Shnoll Effect or the chapter with the same title.

For a summary of earlier postings see Latest progress in TGD.

For the lists of articles (most of them published in journals founded by Huping Hu) and books about TGD see this.