http://www.ananova.com/news/story/sm_962658.html?menu=news.scienceanddiscovery
Scientists say the Universe could be a billion years older than was previously thought. Measurements made in an underground laboratory suggest the atomic reaction that produces energy inside stars is slower than was believed. It means estimates of stellar lifetimes are too short. A readjustment gives the Universe an age of 14.7 instead of 13.7 billion years. The results, to be published in the journal Physics Review Letters, comes from Luna - the Laboratory for Underground Nuclear Astrophysics - situated underneath Gran Sasso mountain in Italy. Scientists from the Italian Institute of Nuclear Physics and the University of Bochum in Germany are reproducing one of the energy-producing nuclear reactions that takes place inside the Sun. "In an ordinary laboratory on the surface the effects of the reaction studied by Luna would be hidden by similar, but much more abundant, effects. "Because our laboratory is under 1,400m of rock we have an isolated base to make these delicate measurements," says Luna co-ordinator Dr Carlo Broggini. xponent Lying About Our Age Maru rob
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