The church of SM physics

Quote from Bruce__H

One place where everyone can agree Poisson noise should appear is in the background spectra. So I have a question. Was the same background spectrum used for producing the the 2 background-subtracted spectra shown in Figure 1 of your ResearchGate manuscript?

The reason I ask is because I have realized that the noise that must be part of Wyttenbach's background spectra accounts for the small wiggles I see in Figure 1 of the ResearchGate paper. Wiggles such as the ones I have drawn a box around , here ...

I don't believe that these are peaks corresponding to separate gamma lines because they go up and down much faster than is compatible with the physics of the NaI crystal in the detector Wyttenbach uses. Instead, I think that these wiggles represent Poisson noise in the background samples and appear here because of the subtraction process. They are about the right size for Poisson noise.

If the same background sample was used for background subtraction in both the spectra seen in Figure 1, it would explain why each and every such wiggle is replicated in both spectra. Whether or not the same background was used repeatedly when preparing these spectra is undocumented.

It would be interesting to know whether Wyttenbach is interpreting each and every wiggle here as a separate spectral line.

Quote from Bruce__H If the same background sample was used for background subtraction in both the spectra seen in Figure

Quote from Wyttenbach

how about once reading the text?

I have read the text and also searched for every occurrence of "background" in it and don't see where you have explained whether the 2 spectra in Figure 1 were both subtracted using the same background spectrum. I apologize if I have simply missed it. Please let me know where you indicate this.

Quote from Bruce__H

The reason I ask is because I have realized that the noise that must be part of Wyttenbach's background spectra accounts for the small wiggles I see in Figure 1 of the ResearchGate paper. Wiggles such as the ones I have drawn a box around , here ...

I don't believe that these are peaks corresponding to separate gamma lines because they go up and down much faster than is compatible with the physics of the NaI crystal in the detector Wyttenbach uses. Instead, I think that these wiggles represent Poisson noise in the background samples and appear here because of the subtraction process. They are about the right size for Poisson noise.

If the same background sample was used for background subtraction in both the spectra seen in Figure 1, it would explain why each and every such wiggle is replicated in both spectra. Whether or not the same background was used repeatedly when preparing these spectra is undocumented.

It would be interesting to know whether Wyttenbach is interpreting each and every wiggle here as a separate spectral line.

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Subtraction of a spectra with peaks results in a background-subtracted profile with deep "fissures", which can create the impression of peaks at the shoulders of the subtracted former peak.

Quote from Paradigmnoia

Subtraction of a spectra with peaks results in a background-subtracted profile with deep "fissures", which can create the impression of peaks at the shoulders of the subtracted former peak.

It can indeed. One of my very first questions I had on first reading this manuscript was why the down-going features in these background-subtracted spectra were so much sharper than the up-going ones. For instance, look at the right side of the Figure 1 spectrum below

I see big humps separated by things that look like upside-down peaks.

One reason for this slow climb and sudden dip might be that LENR is a 'bursty' phenomenon, not a continuous one. Heat and particle emission start to appear, build to a peak and then vanish suddenly, presumably when the active cold fusion zones are disordered by the heart produced. If the reactor environment is right these zones eventually re-order and become active again, or more probably other regions of the fuel pellet are activated.

This phenomenon is not unique to out work, but has been noted by many other researchers.

Quote from Bruce__H

Wiggles such as the ones I have drawn a box around , here ...

Quote from Paradigmnoia

deep "fissures",

Brucian wiggles brucian humps ...fissures

I guess Wyttenbach just got lucky with false positives

eg Sm 151

Quote from Alan Smith

One reason for this slow climb and sudden dip might be that LENR is a 'bursty' phenomenon, not a continuous one. Heat and particle emission start to appear, build to a peak and then vanish suddenly, presumably when the active cold fusion zones are disordered by the heart produced. If the reactor environment is right these zones eventually re-order and become active again, or more probably other regions of the fuel pellet are activated.

This phenomenon is not unique to out work, but has been noted by many other researchers.

When the properties of this fuel were first announced 4 years ago, I realized that one could characterize the excess heat production as "temperature-sensitive heat production". If one assumes that these properties are genuine, then everything you are saying here would be correct. The fuel should have active states and inactive states separated by one or more temperature thresholds. And, depending on the parameters, you should get interesting spatial and temporal patterns of activity in different parts of the fuel ... a bit like a Belousov-Zhabotinsky reaction, which you might know of. But I don't think that any of this would have to do with slow climbs and sudden dips in the energy spectrum as seen in Wyttenbach's manuscript.

Quote from RobertBryant

eg Sm 151

and then there is gadolinium 155..luck would have it?

Quote from Wyttenbach

how about once reading the text?

I am still trying to learn whether the same background was used when producing both spectra in your Figure 1. Please let me know. I really don't see this explained in the text.

Quote from Wyttenbach

Of course the same! I said this already in an earlier post...

OK. Thank you! I must have missed it earlier.

If both spectra in Figure 1 have been prepared by subtracting the same background, would Poisson noise in the background not account for both spectra having lots of nearly identical small peaks? I have in mind, for instance, the small peaks seen inside the box I previously drew on the 250C spectrum in Figure 1 (reproduced below) which are extremely similar to peaks in the 380C spectrum.

Quote from RobertBryant

and then there is gadolinium 155..luck would have it?

and then there is tellurium125...avoiding the Brucian humpfish luckily

Quote from Wyttenbach

The software does interpolation. What you see is just for fun has no relevance as only the bins contain the truth. As said in the text. It's just to show how stable the overall picture is but not in the details...

Even if you claim to see a peek in reality it might be none.

You say that the information shown in Figures 1 and 2 is not relevant to peak-finding. Very well then. Since the rest of the work described in your manuscript depends on the effectiveness of your methods for locating spectral peaks, you should produce one or more figures that are informative on this point. Right now, you do not show the primary data that underlie your results ... the spectra themselves. But it would be trivially easy for you to do this. You have what you call the "histogram files". Just plot them! And include some arrows showing some of the peaks located by your algorithm.

Without this, your readers cannot judge the quality of your work. For instance given the low bin counts in your samples, Poisson noise will be a major component of the background spectrum and this raises the possibility of causing false positives in your peak hunts. Also, scattered photons emanating from your fuel will contribute a spurious signal at many energies in the spectrum. So how big an effect is this? How narrow are the lines you claim to be detecting compared to the effective energy resolution of your detector? These are all legitimate questions that could potentially undercut your results in a drastic function. Indeed, the worst case scenario here is that hundreds of your peak identifications are false. You need to make your case in such a way that readers can understand all these things.

Quote from Wyttenbach

Already showing all lines and the whole process is far more we wanted to show a few months ago.

I don't understand. Is there a typo or a word missing here?

Is the missing word "than"? Is this supposed to read "Already showing all lines and the whole process is far more than we wanted to show a few months ago."?

Quote from Wyttenbach

It's a question of copyright and research knowledge. Already showing all lines and the whole process is far more we wanted to show a few months ago. But as people start to use our recommendations we have to prevent foreign patents based on our research.

What we always can do is giving spectra under strict NDA or to people we know that respect foreign property.

From what you have said previously, I think you believe that posting spectra showing energies above 300 keV somehow tips someone off about something or other. Fine. All I am concerned about here is that you post spectra with enough information that readers can judge how realistic and effective your arguments are in the rest of the manuscript. So just post actual spectra below 300 keV ... as in Figures 1 and 2. If you don't do this, then your manuscript is basically pseudoscience in the sense of being made to look as though it is real science, but not being real at all (because you never allow an evaluation of the evidence).