Dennis’ Random Produce facts

[Dennis]

Hey I’m bored at work most days and I’m a produce manager at a store so I’m going to post one of these even if no one looks. 
 

Fact 1. The black spots on bananas is actually a small version of antimatter reaction this was discovered by college kids doing research on the topic. Look it up. 

[Fyi]

Not a produce fact but a food fact

The mold that grows on bread when it gets old is literally just penecillin, an antibiotic. So if you're ever sick, just eat moldy bread.

[Bananaberry]

quick facts

[Craigary]

If you eat an orange, you no longer have to worry about being hungry.

Food fact #3

Edited January 25, 2020 by Craigary

[Dennis]

Fact #2: one average sized apple weighs half a pound. 

[Dennis]

Fact #3: More avocados are sold super bowl week/end then in the rest of the combine. 

[Eclipse]

Brown spots or bruises on bananas are actually due to a chemical called ethylene being produced in the banana. This chemical makes the banana ripe, but it doesn't really know when to stop producing the chemical so it keeps producing it and gets over ripe and gains brown spots.

[Dennis]

2 hours ago, Eclipse said:

Brown spots or bruises on bananas are actually due to a chemical called ethylene being produced in the banana. This chemical makes the banana ripe, but it doesn't really know when to stop producing the chemical so it keeps producing it and gets over ripe and gains brown spots.

This is really about potassium, not about bananas. They're just put in to add colour. Bananas contain potassium but so do lots of fruits and vegetables. But 'spinach produces antimatter...' doesn't have the same impact.

Potassium has 19 protons. Most of the potassium around is isotope 39 (20 neutrons) or 41 (22 neutrons) but there is a small fraction (0.012%) of isotope 40. With 19 protons and 21 neutrons this is an "odd-odd" nucleus. These are very uncommon. Nuclei with even numbers of protons and/or neutrons have lower energies than those with odd numbers (due to the pairing term in the semi-empirical mass fomula - see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Semi-empirical_mass_formula for details).

An odd-odd nucleus can convert to a lower energy even-even nucleus state by changing one of its neutrons into a proton, which happens through 𝛽−β− decay, or by changing one of its protons into a neutron, which can happen in two ways: 𝛽+β+ decay, or electon capture (often abbreviated to EC). That gves 3 possibilities:

𝑛→𝑝𝑒−𝜈⎯⎯⎯𝑝→𝑛𝑒+𝜈𝑝+𝑒−→𝑛𝜈n→pe−ν¯p→ne+νp+e−→nν

All these are possible but the rate depends on the energy difference: decays releasing more energy are more probable. That gives a big advantage to the first option, 𝛽−β− decay, as the neutron has a larger mass than the proton (939.6 MeV as opposed to 938.3, giving 1.3 MeV more energy). However it just happens that the 4040Ca state that results from 𝛽−β− decay (moving one up the periodic table) has a 0.7 MeV higher energy than the 4040Ar state that comes from 𝛽+β+ or EC (moving one down). That removes a lot of the 1.3 MeV handicap and so the process are comparable - the 𝛽−β− still dominates, but 'only' takes 90% of the rate, leaving 10%.

 

Even within this 10% the EC process wins over 𝛽+β+ because it has the rest-mass energy of the electron and doesn't have to find the 0.5 MeV needed to make a positron. (The electron in EC is one of the atomic electrons from an 𝑠s shell, as the wavefunction is not zero at the origin, which is where the nucleus is.) So the 𝛽+β+ decay is a very rare fraction of the 4040 K decays - and in turn there are few of these as the half life is a very long 1.3 Bn years (it is so long because these energy differences are so small). 

So potassium gives you positrons. Not many (one per banana per 75 mintes is the canonical figure). If you want positrons in the laboratory, 2222 Na - another odd-odd nucleus, and the processes are the same but the energies are greater - is a much more effective source. But this does not occur naturally, you have to make it in a cyclotron.

 

^ this is what I meant I understand the other part lmao, also this is apart of a project I’m doing for one of my college classes about a banana powered antimatter device for space travel. 

[Luckyy]

Food Fact #4 the Harris teeter bathroom is usually clogged with shit that's most likely made of food 

[Fyi]

6 minutes ago, Lucky said:

Food Fact #4 the Harris teeter bathroom is usually clogged with shit that's most likely made of food 

lucky you cant mention harris teeter nobody that isnt from nc is gonna know what that is

[Luckyy]

1 hour ago, Fyi said:

lucky you cant mention harris teeter nobody that isnt from nc is gonna know what that is

FUCKER THERES ONE IN MINT HILL SOUTH CAROLINA. GET GAMERED ON

 

[Fyi]

17 minutes ago, Lucky said:

FUCKER THERES ONE IN MINT HILL SOUTH CAROLINA. GET GAMERED ON

 

its still a carolina you goon

[Luckyy]

1 hour ago, Fyi said:

its still a carolina you goon

Racist

[Wheezy]

Ithyphallophobia is the fear of erections

 

Food fact #6

[Dennis]

Produce Fact# 3: when a potato goes bad it smells like someone died 

produce fact #4 the heaviest part of a pepper is the stem