It's not the direct relation to the sun that really made me wonder why it wasn't noticed before, it was this statement:
'...Experimental error and environmental conditions have all been ruled out -- the decay rates are changing throughout the year in a predictable pattern....'
If decay rates have been varying in predictable patterns for all these years why are we just noticing it now? Decay rates have been measured ad nauseum for all kinds of elements over the years - I'd think a change like this would have been noticed before now. Again, unless this is a relatively new behaviour so could not have been observed before now.
