CERN Scientists Capture Antimatter For Record 16 Minutes

[Glademaster_v1legacy]

Well I don't think anyone would be stupid enough to use an anti matter bomb. As one gram of matter and anti matter(a total of 2 grams so 1 gram of each in case I phrased that badly) will give you a bomb yield of 86 tonnes of TNT. Unless I made a mistake. Next to find the Higgs Boson or not.

 

[jack583]

an anti matter bomb, i think, would be seen as similer to a nucleur bomb, and would be outlawed world-wide

 

[WouldYouKindly]

Anti-matter annihilation weaponry, wonderful.

 

[Earnest Cavalli]

On second thought, maybe it's best that you just don't report on science stories at all. You fail physics forever.

I was wondering how long it'd take to elicit this reaction.

Technically, you're correct (the best kind of correct), but you seem to be missing the point that the key aspect of reporting on scientific results is not to explicitly illustrate every detail, but is instead to break the concept down into terms which are more easily understood by the general public.

I could have penned a report that explained exactly how an antimatter weapon might work, but it would take days and clock in at tens of thousands of words. Who is going to read that?

As for your rebuttal to my succinct description, again, you're technically correct, but at the same time you're letting your semantics get in the way of the realization that without anything left to observe (and no one to even conceive of any observable elements), an antimatter weapon would, effectively, destroy reality.

(If you'd like, I can also convincingly argue my point philosophically via incredibly pretentious allusions to Soren Kierkegaard, but again, who wants to read ten thousand words that really only function as evidence that I'm very, very bright?)

Oh, and the same goes for your thing about "theories," though let's substitute "importance of using layman's terms" with "importance of using the common, if technically incorrect vernacular that the English language has naturally evolved toward."

Happy?

 

[McMullen]

And so it begins....

First Nuclear weapons, now Anit-Material Weapons....

God help us all xD

On a serious note....what is Anti-Matter

what is Anti-Matter

It's sort of negative matter; if you combine a particle and it's anti-matter equivalent (electron and anti-electron, proton and anti-proton) the net result is 0 matter. A nuclear bomb sends out high energy particles and waves and this disrupts matter, anti-matter annihilates it.

The process of annihilation releases a lot of energy so theoretically matter/anti-matter reactions could be used as an incredible power source, but for now the process of creating an containing anti-matter is prohibitive.

It should be noted here that nuclear bombs and antimatter have very little to do with each other, other than that both are capable of releasing a lot of energy in a short amount of time by converting mass to energy. Nuclear weapons work by converting a fraction of a mass of uranium or plutonium to energy. The Hiroshima device, which contained several kilograms of nuclear fuel (I forget whether it was uranium or plutonium) converted about the mass of an American penny. When antimatter comes into contact with an equivalent mass of regular matter, ALL of the mass is converted to energy. So, if you had half an antipenny, allowing it to contact regular matter (air, for example) would recreate the Hiroshima blast.

Despite it's enormous energy-release capabilities, it doesn't work well as a source of fuel because 1) it's hard to make, 2) you can't store it in conventional containers without it combining with them, and 3) the second law of thermodynamics says that, as with all fuels, in the process of making antimatter from scratch you lose more energy than you would get back from it. In order to be a good fuel, we'd have to find a natural source of it, say an antiplanet, and find a way to mine it without actually landing there or touching it with any regular matter. Thing is, as far as we can tell all the stars and planets in the universe are made of regular matter, so even if there were enough antimatter to make a planet somewhere, regular asteroids would take big chunks out of it over time. A regular asteroid impact is quite a destructive event all by itself. An asteroid hitting an antiplanet or a antiasteroid hitting a planet would be quite spectacular.

 

[Elamdri]

Why do I have this image of Dr. Device in my head right now >.>

 

[fundayz]

Uh oh, don't let Anonymous get a hold of some real Low Orbit Ion Cannons.

what is Anti-Matter

It's sort of negative matter; if you combine a particle and it's anti-matter equivalent (electron and anti-electron, proton and anti-proton) the net result is 0 matter. A nuclear bomb sends out high energy particles and waves and this disrupts matter, anti-matter annihilates it.

The process of annihilation releases a lot of energy so theoretically matter/anti-matter reactions could be used as an incredible power source, but for now the process of creating an containing anti-matter is prohibitive.

Actually, annihilation of particles can and does release matter/anti-matter. In fact, anything can be released as long as the energy+particles released contain exactly the same energy content as the colliding particles.

It just happens that material particles are very unstable at high energy states and thus most of the energy in the colliding particles is given off as radiation.

 

[No_Remainders]

Anti-matter annihilation weaponry, wonderful.

There was a show I saw... Through The Wormhole With Morgan Freeman on Discovery Channel.

Apparently anti-matter the size of a grain of rice combined with matter would release an explosion the size of the Hiroshima bomb, or something of the like.

Scary shit.

 

[Icarion (aka Stockholm)]

The first thing I would do if I worked at CERN would be to turn to my co-worker and say "I dare you to stick your hand in there."

 

[Glademaster_v1legacy]

Anti-matter annihilation weaponry, wonderful.

There was a show I saw... Through The Wormhole With Morgan Freeman on Discovery Channel.

Apparently anti-matter the size of a grain of rice combined with matter would release an explosion the size of the Hiroshima bomb, or something of the like.

Scary shit.

1 gram of matter and 1 gram of anti matter would result in a bomb of a yield 86 tonnes of TNT. For playing around to see how powerful you can get just take the value of Matter so say 1kg and the speed of light squared 9*10^16 and multiply by 2. That is the energy. For tonne TNT yield then divide than by 4.184*10^9.

 

[newwiseman]

And so it begins....

First Nuclear weapons, now Anit-Material Weapons....

God help us all xD

On a serious note....what is Anti-Matter

First chemical, then Fission, then Fusion, now anti-matter.

Antimatter has an opposite electrical charge to it's normal matter counter part.

Hydrogen = 1 + proton and 1 - electron.
Anti-Hydrogen = 1 - proton and 1 + electron.

Neutrons still carry a neutral charge.

Electrical opposites are drawn magnetically to each other and when they combine the particles fall apart into the base components releasing lots of heat, and some magic theoretical stuff.

The quark gluon plasma possible created the other day is way cooler, and about as dangerous.

 

[Nocta-Aeterna]

Now this is exciting news if I ever saw it. I'm most curious for the test results.

 

[monojono]

My only hope is that the idea of an antimatter bomb (which could literally explode reality) proves too existentially horrifying for anyone to ever actually build such a thing.

An antimatter bomb would create a big explosion, it would not damage or explode reality. Even Dan Brown figured that out...

 

[Glademaster_v1legacy]

Can someone please explain to me what an "anti-matter bomb" is, and whether it has any chance of coming to exist in reality or whether its just some joke made by the OP?

Very unlikely as you would have to be able to store anti matter which is not possible at the moment. Basically when matter and anti matter combine they release lots of energy to make your own equation to find out how and do this.

1 gram of matter and 1 gram of anti matter would result in a bomb of a yield 86 tonnes of TNT. For playing around to see how powerful you can get just take the value of Matter so say 1kg and the speed of light squared 9*10^16 and multiply by 2. That is the energy. For tonne TNT yield then divide than by 4.184*10^9.

 

[klaynexas3]

i hope this will be used as a power source, not as a weapon. it has the same ability as everything else however, to do great good and great evil.

if we have antimatter, thus the possibility of an alternate universe, does this mean that nega-scott is real? or the nega-chin!!! that'd be worse than any weapons used by the antimatter by far. let's hope that much isn't so...

 

[The Great JT]

Somehow, I sense that learning more about anti-matter will make someone stumble upon and use the Anti-Life Equation [http://dc.wikia.com/wiki/Anti-Life_Equation].

I'll see you all when we're all part of the collective. You can just call me Drone #8,498,276.

 

[GrizzlerBorno]

Angels and Demons.

There. I said it.

 

[McMullen]

On second thought, maybe it's best that you just don't report on science stories at all. You fail physics forever.

I was wondering how long it'd take to illicit this reaction.

Technically, you're correct (the best kind of correct), but you seem to be missing the point that the key aspect of reporting on scientific results is not to explicitly illustrate every detail, but is instead to break the concept down into terms which are more easily understood by the general public.

I could have penned a report that explained exactly how an antimatter weapon might work, but it would take days and clock in at tens of thousands of words. Who is going to read that?

As for your rebuttal to my succinct description, again, you're technically correct, but at the same time you're letting your semantics get in the way of the realization that without anything left to observe (and no one to even conceive of any observable elements), an antimatter weapon would, effectively, destroy reality.

(If you'd like, I can also convincingly argue my point philosophically via incredibly pretentious allusions to Soren Kierkegaard, but again, who wants to read ten thousand words that really only function as evidence that I'm very, very bright?)

Oh, and the same goes for your thing about "theories," though let's substitute "importance of using layman's terms" with "importance of using the common, if technically incorrect vernacular that the English language has naturally evolved toward."

Happy?

I understand breaking the concept down so that it is easily understandable for the layperson. As a science textbook illustrator, this is exactly my job. However, it is vital when doing so to make sure that such simplifications retain a connection to reality. Yours do not. Antimatter bombs are as far from being feasible as traveling through time or faster than light, and even if they were feasible, they wouldn't necessarily be any more destructive than nuclear bombs (yes, if you make enough antimatter, you can destroy the earth, but a suitably rich and idiotic civilization could probably do the same thing much more cheaply with a big enough hydrogen bomb). Antimatter detonations do not destroy reality, technically, figuratively, or in any other sense, any more than nuclear weapons do.

As for using "theory" in the incorrect sense because that's how the public thinks of it, that is exactly the problem and your predecessors in the journalistic profession are largely to blame for it. Simply continuing this trend because that's how it's always been done is lazy and mildly irresponsible, and when you actually understand the difference (which you seem to), it shows a lack of integrity. Calling a hypothesis a hypothesis takes no effort on your part except typing an extra four characters per instance of the word, and will not confuse your audience. As a bonus, it also happens to be the truth. True, the theory/hypothesis mixup is not the worst of the things that cause scientific illiteracy, but it is an indirect contributor to many others that do, and it would be best if as many journalists as possible stopped doing this. Considering how little effort it takes, I don't understand your reluctance.

 

[KirbyKrackle]

For anyone interested in the whole antimatter business, CERN set up a cute FAQ 'round about the time that Angels and Demons was out in theatres:

http://public.web.cern.ch/public/en/spotlight/SpotlightAandD-en.html

It can answer some of the questions and concerns in some of these posts, such as

a) Can we use antimatter as an energy source?
b) Can we use it as a weapon?
c) Well then what can we use it for?

(Although if you prefer a quick summary, the answers are nope, nope, and probably more medical advances.)