A Brief Video History of Antimatter:
Creating Antimatter and the Future Implications:
Scientists at the Geneva particle-based research lababory, CERN, have created anitmatter. By trapping 38 antihydrogen atoms in a magnetic bottle, scientists can begin to measure and compare matter and antimatter. This is the first step in three fields, first understanding The Great Bang that created our Universe, second, it is the start the engineering of antimatter weapons, and possibly antimatter power stations.
Here is a photo of the machine used to make antihydrogen atoms:
When matter and antimatter meet, they destroying "... each other instantly on contact in a violent flash of energy." [CNN] Here's how the explosion works:
"In an antiatom, the antimatter equivalent of an ordinary atom, the electrical charges of all the component particles are reversed; while an ordinary atom has a positively charged nucleus with one or more negatively charged electrons orbiting it, the antimatter atom has a negatively charged nucleus with positively charged orbiting electrons. An ordinary atomic nucleus contains positively charged protons, while its antimatter counterpart contains negatively charged antiprotons." [New York Times]
When the matter and antimatter meet, as two opposite electrical charges meet, they create a flash of energy. There has been prior research where scientists have created antiprotons and antielectrons, but this was the first time antimatter atoms have ever been created.
The Antimatter Bomb?
The dream here is to eventually be able to harness this energy for possible use as well as understand the makings of our Universe.
