3 ms·
The primary channel is the inverse beta decay where an anti-neutrino interacts with a proton to produce a neutron and a positron (via a W boson like you said).
by welterde 8y ago
The primary channel is the inverse beta decay where an anti-neutrino interacts with a proton to produce a neutron and a positron (via a W boson like you said).
It can also just scatter of an electron (via either the W or the Z boson).
But the important point is that it's only via the weak interaction (meaning only via the W^\pm and Z^0 bosons).
- stephengillie 8y agoAt first, it sounds like an anti-neutrino can "spontaneously" emit a positron to form a W boson, instead of finding an electron. On re-reading, it's like the neutrino "bumps" the positive charge out of the proton. Like the neutrino interacting with a down quark will convert them into an up quark and a positron. Edit: Inverse beta decay, commonly abbreviated to IBD, is a nuclear reaction involving electron antineutrino scattering off a proton, creating a positron and a neutron. ... The IBD reaction can only be initiated when the antineutrino possesses at least 1.806 MeV of kinetic energy (called the threshold energy). This threshold energy is due to a difference in mass between the products ( positron and neutrino ) and the reactants ( antineutrino and proton ) and also slightly due to a relativistic mass effect on the antineutrino. Most of the antineutrino energy is distributed to the positron due to its small mass relative to the neutron. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inverse_beta_decay https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inverse_beta_decay To state the obvious, since the Neutrino is massless, its energy can only come from momentum. Hence the distribution of the 1.806 MeV from the Wiki article above: P+ to N: 1.293 MeV Positron: 0.511 MeV total: 1.804 MeV (rounding error?)