Alt text:
Unlike an Iron Age collapse, a Bronze Age collapse releases energy, since copper and tin are past the iron peak on the curve of binding energy.
this post was submitted on 27 Nov 2023
216 points (98.6% liked)
xkcd
8977 readers
214 users here now
A community for a webcomic of romance, sarcasm, math, and language.
founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
First row is real. Second row, not so much.
That said, the "one big nucleon" is pretty close in concept to a neutron star. It needs a few more nucleons than there are in a single atom though. Just a few. And it's not really a decay mode as it is a gravitational effect.
It's also kind of reminiscent of superatoms - clusters of atoms that act like one single atom - but that is very much not the same. (The nuclei aren't fused. They maintain regular, sensible, atomic distances. Electrons are free to pass between. etc.)