Antimatter-Matters Mirror
Author: R. Micheal Barnett of Berkeley National Laboratory Published: January 24, 2002 Article
Antimatter. Any Strek fan can tell you that every Federation ship runs on this “magic” fuel, but what is it really? In scientific terms it is an oppositely charged particle (opposite relative to matter). By opposite I mean an electron in matter which has a negative charge has an antimatter parrellel in the positron which has a positive charge and the proton (positive) has the antiproton (negative). Now when antimatter and matter collide they annihilate each other and their energy is transformed. Anyone who has read Angels and Demons by Dan Brown has heard of the destructive power of antimatter. Luckily, we can not yet make enough antimatter to pose any real threat. You may think ” Why are we made of matter and not antimatter?” The answer is unknown, but many tests have shown that during the big bang a difference of one matter over antimatter would have given us the current levels of matter and antimatter. When antimatter and matter annihilate each other the energy they realease is exponential. This aspect of antimatter is being researched as a “miracle” fuel source. It is 100% efficient, to compare nuclear power is only about 15% efficient, it produces no harnful radiation, and one kilogram has the power to run the entire U.S. for half a year. However, that same kilogram can vaporize a 10 mile radius. I don’t mean ruined city, I mean perfect crater. As of now we don’t have a way to create enough antimatter for this to be effective. It would take the Hadron Super Collider one trillion years to create one kilogram of antimatter.
If we could find an efficient way to make large quantities of antimatter would you use it or would the possible annihilation make you think twice?
antimatter explosion in space
2 Responses to “Antimatter-Matters Mirror”
Leave a Reply
I think it would be good to have as a fuel source, but knowing how voliatle mankind can be, I think that we would just try to make a superbomb with it. With just a little bit you could have a bomb bigger and safer(radiation wise) than the atomic bomb. I think that possibility would be too tempting for us to say no to. That would be even scarier than a nuclear war is.
[Reply]
I would use it just becuase of the fact that I find it very interesting and differnt.
[Reply]