Analysis by Ian O'Neill
Wed Aug 25, 2010 02:21 PM ET

When probing the deepest reaches of the Cosmos or magnifying our understanding of the quantum world, a whole host of mysteries present themselves. This is to be expected when pushing our knowledge of the Universe to the limit.

But what if a well-known -- and apparently constant -- characteristic of matter starts behaving mysteriously?

This is exactly what has been noticed in recent years; the decay rates of radioactive elements are changing. This is especially mysterious as we are talking about elements with "constant" decay rates -- these values aren't supposed to change. School textbooks teach us this from an early age.

This is the conclusion that researchers from Stanford and Purdue University have arrived at, but the only explanation they have is even weirder than the phenomenon itself: The sun might be emitting a previously unknown particle that is meddling with the decay rates of matter. Or, at the very least, we are seeing some new physics.

Many fields of science depend on measuring constant decay rates. For example, to accurately date ancient artifacts, archaeologists measure the quantity of carbon-14 found inside organic samples at dig sites. This is a technique known as carbon dating.

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