Symbol R_0

The passage around this formula

…produces a straight line whose slope gives the age and whose intercept gives the initial composition directly: $R_t = R_0 + \frac{N_{87}}{N_{86}}\left(e^{\lambda t} - 1\right)$. where $R_t$ is each mineral’s measured present-day strontium-87 to strontium-86 ratio, $R_0$ is the shared initial ratio recovered as the line’s intercept, and $N_{87}$/$N_{86}$ is each mineral’s measured rubidium-87 to strontium-86 ratio [ 18 ] . The initial composition is no longer an assumption fed into the calculation; it is an output the data themselves supply, and a poor fit to a…

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