Scientists at CERN trap anti-matter for the first time

[GPDP]

http://gizmodo.com/5692614/antimatter-trapped-for-the-first-time


Get ready for that warp drive spaceship (http://gizmodo.com/5292471/this-is-how-a-warp-drive-spaceship-looks), because we are now one step closer to it. After creating antihydrogen in their antiproton decelerator, scientists at CERN have been able to trap antimatter for the first time in history.

This a big step. First, it gets humanity closer to understanding one of the biggest mysteries of the Universe: What happened to all the antimatter that was created during the Big Bang? In theory, matter and antimatter were created in equal parts during the Big Bang. However, the latter disappeared shortly thereafter. Or at least, we can't seem to find it. The spokesman for CERN's ALPHA experiment—Jeffrey Hangst of Aarhus University, Denmark—says that trapping these atoms was a bit of an overwhelming experience:
What's new about Alpha is that now we've managed to hold on to those atoms. We have a magnetic bowl, kind of a bottle, that holds the antihydrogen [...] For reasons that no one yet understands, nature ruled out antimatter. It is thus very rewarding, and a bit overwhelming, to look at the ALPHA device and know that it contains stable, neutral atoms of antimatter.
CERN created the first nine atoms of antihydrogen in 1995, and then started to produce atoms in large quantities in 2002, as part of the ATHENA and ATRAP experiments. This is the first time that scientists have been able to trap antihydrogen atoms for a long enough time to study them, keeping them at 9 degrees kelvin (-443.47 degrees Fahrenheit, -264.15 degrees Celsius), suspended in a magnetic field inside this Ghostbusters-style machine.
http://cache.gawkerassets.com/assets/images/4/2010/11/500x_1011301_13-a4-at-144-dpi.jpg (http://cache.gawkerassets.com/assets/images/4/2010/11/1011301_13-a4-at-144-dpi.jpg)
The other reason why this is an important step is its potential to solve our need for unlimited energy. When antihydrogen touches matter—as shown in the image above—it releases a huge amount of energy. Many scientists speculate that antimatter may be the key to provide unlimited power capable of driving machines that are unthinkable right now. Eventually, it could be the stuff that could power new engines capable of taking us to the stars (http://gizmodo.com/5247705/why-we-need-to-reach-the-stars-and-we-will) at near-light speed.
The energy per unit mass (9×1016 J/kg) is about 10 orders of magnitude greater than chemical energy, about 4 orders of magnitude greater than nuclear energy that can be liberated today using nuclear fission, and about 2 orders of magnitude greater than the best possible from fusion.
The reaction of 1 kilogram of antimatter with 1 kilogram of matter would produce 180 petajoules of energy or the rough equivalent of 43 megatons of TNT. For comparison, Tsar Bomba, the largest nuclear weapon ever detonated, reacted an estimated yield of 50 megatons, which required the use of hundreds of kilograms of fissile material. Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antimatter#Fuel)
Or maybe we will just manage to destroy the world in one big honkin explosion of strawberry and cherry goo. It can go either way.


But fear not, we are not there yet. At this stage, scientists are still trying to comprehend how antimatter works. This is one more—although very important—step in this quest. [CERN (http://cdsweb.cern.ch/record/1307522)]


Thoughts? This is exciting news. We are one step closer to someday achieving virtually unlimited energy.

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

Thoughts? This is exciting news. We are one step closer to someday achieving virtually unlimited energy.

Not in the least. It takes enormous amounts of energy to produce truly miniscule amounts of antimatter, and even given potential advances in technology, antimatter will at best be a way of storing (some of the) energy already generated. Antimatter reactors might become practical if we were to cover the planet Mercury in solar energy collectors and use the energy gathered to produce antimatter - but it would still only be a way of storing energy.

Atomic Rockets (http://www.projectrho.com/rocket/spacegunexotic.php#Antimatter~Containment) has this to say about antimatter production:

"Current particle accelerators are horribly inefficient at generating antimatter, but Dr. Forward says this is because they were designed by physicists, not industrial engineers. He is of the opinion that a dedicated antimatter factory built with current technology could approach 0.01% efficiency (which isn't good but is still about 6000 times better than Fermilab). The theoretical maximum is 50% efficiency due to the pesky Law of Baryon Number Conservation (which demands that when turning energy into matter, equal amounts of matter and antimatter must be created)."

[GPDP]

Interesting. So other than developing energy storage, what else can we gather from researching anti-matter?

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

Interesting. So other than developing energy storage, what else can we gather from researching anti-matter?

It may not provide us with unlimited energy, but cheap(er) antimatter would still be a revolutionary technical development - interplanetary travel would be considerably easier with the amounts of energy that having antimatter enables you to throw around, and if the storage issue can be better resolved, then smaller applications would be able to use much greater amounts of energy. One conjecture I have read is to store anti-protons in a carbon nanobottle, which in mass form would resemble a powder. Would still be dangerous to handle, but much safer compared with the the raw stuff.

[Salyut]

Not in the least. It takes enormous amounts of energy to produce truly miniscule amounts of antimatter, and even given potential advances in technology, antimatter will at best be a way of storing (some of the) energy already generated. Antimatter reactors might become practical if we were to cover the planet Mercury in solar energy collectors and use the energy gathered to produce antimatter - but it would still only be a way of storing energy.

Atomic Rockets (http://www.projectrho.com/rocket/spacegunexotic.php#Antimatter~Containment) has this to say about antimatter production:

"Current particle accelerators are horribly inefficient at generating antimatter, but Dr. Forward says this is because they were designed by physicists, not industrial engineers. He is of the opinion that a dedicated antimatter factory built with current technology could approach 0.01% efficiency (which isn't good but is still about 6000 times better than Fermilab). The theoretical maximum is 50% efficiency due to the pesky Law of Baryon Number Conservation (which demands that when turning energy into matter, equal amounts of matter and antimatter must be created)."

Self replicating factories laying down particle accelerator goodness along the lunar equator.

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

Self replicating factories laying down particle accelerator goodness along the lunar equator.

I suppose the Moon is closer to Earth, but on the other hand, insolation (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Insolation) is less and this is not compensated since the Moon has a smaller overall surface area.

But as an interim project it may still be worthwhile.