Weird Archaeology 101: Solar Flares Affect Radioactive Decay Rates

While fascinating scientific inquiry still underway, expect to see this in Creationist and other alternative archaeology/paleontology/geology arguments very soon.

"It’s a mystery that presented itself unexpectedly: The radioactive decay of some elements sitting quietly in laboratories on Earth seemed to be influenced by activities inside the sun, 93 million miles away.

Is this possible?

Researchers from Stanford and Purdue universities believe it is. But their explanation of how it happens opens the door to yet another mystery."

And

The story begins, in a sense, in classrooms around the world, where students are taught that the rate of decay of a specific radioactive material is a constant. This concept is relied upon, for example, when anthropologists use carbon-14 to date ancient artifacts and when doctors determine the proper dose of radioactivity to treat a cancer patient.

The Strange Case of Solar Flares and Radioactive Elements [symmetrybreaking]