antimatter tagged posts

A Kyoto University-based team has unraveled the mystery of gamma-ray emission cascades caused by lightning strikes. Credit: Kyoto University/Teruaki Enoto

Researchers find that lightning strikes causes photonuclear reactions in the atmosphere, creating antimatter. Researchers from Japan describe how gamma rays from lightning react with the air to produce radioisotopes and even positrons – the antimatter equivalent of electrons. “We already knew that thunderclouds and lightning emit gamma rays, and hypothesized that they would react in some way with the nuclei of environmental elements in the atmosphere,” explains Teruaki Enoto from Kyoto University.

“In winter, Japan’s western coastal area is ideal for observing powerful lightning and thunderstorms...

This is a view from the Experimental Zone floor of the ALPHA-2 Cryostat and external solenoid assembly, with control and data acquisition electronics located on the overhead platform above the cryostat. Credit: Photo by Robert Thompson, ALPHA-2 member, University of Calgary

Latest breakthrough has been via studying the properties of antihydrogen. The result is an improved measurement of the charge of antihydrogen by a factor of 20. It is the latest contribution in the quest to find the answer to the antimatter question, ‘If matter and antimatter were created in equal amounts during the Big Bang, where did all the antimatter go?’

“That means the electrical charge of antihydrogen – the antimatter analogue of hydrogen – can be ruled out as the answer to the antimatter question,” says York Uni...

A simulation of a lead ion collision in ALICE. Credit: CERN

CERN: Most precise measurement of mass and charge of Light Nuclei and Snti-Nuclei. Why did anti-matter disappear almost completely from our universe, whereas matter did not? Scientists are attempting to solve this mystery at the European research institute at CERN. Now they published the most precise measurement of the properties of light atomic nuclei and anti-nuclei ever made.

At the LHC, researchers let lead nuclei and protons collide at the highest beam energies to date. The temperatures created are 100,000X higher than those in the center of the Sun. “A state is created that is very similar to the one after the Big Bang,” explains Prof Laura Fabbietti...

Weyl fermions could give rise to faster and more efficient electronics because of their unusual ability to behave as matter and antimatter inside a crystal. They could allow for a nearly free and efficient flow of electricity in electronics, and thus greater power, especially for computers.

Proposed by mathematician/ physicist Hermann Weyl in 1929, Weyl fermions have been long sought by scientists because they have been regarded as possible building blocks of other subatomic particles, and are even more basic than electrons (when electrons are moving inside a crystal). Their basic nature means that Weyl fermions could provide a much more stable and efficient transport of particles than electrons, which are the principle particle behind modern electronics...