Antimatter: The Universe's Hidden Balance and Future Potential
29-11-2024, 01:38 PM
Matter and antimatter coexisted when the Universe first began to form. It's perplexing that the two counterparts didn't annihilate each other; if they had, we wouldn't have existed. In fact, we live in a world where matter outnumbers its formation. Scientists believe that an unknown cause occurred in a very, very short time (in a second divided by 10 with 35 zeros in front of it) and resulted in an increase in the production of matter at the expense of antimatter, which is one of the reasons for our existence today.
Scientists were even more perplexed in 2018 when they performed the most precise measurement of antimatter to date and confirmed that antimatter and matter behave nearly identically. The discovery implies that particles and their inverses should have been created in equal quantities at the beginning of the Universe. However, if true, the fact that matter successes over antimatter becomes increasingly challenging to understand.
Researchers are still looking for the criterion that explains matter's dominance over antimatter in our Universe. Calculations indicate that there was a slight imbalance in particle and antiparticle numbers just after the Big Bang, when particles and antiparticles annihilated one another. Less than one out of every billion ordinary particles survived the collision and went on to form all of the matter we see around us today. Our very existence hinges on the slight prevalence of matter over antimatter in the early universe. Yet, as we gaze into the future, it is evident that antimatter holds a wealth of promising potential uses.
The next step in antiparticle applications is to manufacture and store anti-hydrogen in positrons and antiprotons. Storing antimatter is difficult due to its lack of electric charge and magnetically opposing properties, but scientists have proposed several suggestions for preserving and storing it, including using an ultraviolet laser beam and magnetic fields to push it away. Magnetic field can be used to trap anti-hydrogen in snowballs, similar to hydrogen.
In the future, antimatter will be used to create shadows within the body. This new type of imaging has many advantages over existing methods, as the amount of radiation to which the patient is exposed is a hundred times lower. However, this method can be used to completely destroy cancerous tumors.
The most important future application of antimatter will be as a fuel in rocket propulsion engines. To put it simply, this application involves pumping antiprotons into a flask filled with hydrogen gas in a cylinder that serves as a boiler, where the hydrogen reacts with the antiprotons to produce Gamma rays. The energy produced by this reaction will be used to propel the missile; this method of propulsion increases the speed by two or three times when compared to the current chemical propulsion missiles.
Because of the small size of the rocket engine and the low mass of the fuel in relation to the mass of the rocket if antimatter is used as fuel, this application is economical for both near and far travels from Earth.
Traps containing antiprotons will travel around the world in the coming years, not only for scientific research but also for practical applications in medicine. The antimatter will be stored in specially designed facilities.
As the twenty-first century progresses, antimatter will find more and more applications: its production will rise, lowering its price. Then, because a few grams of antimatter will suffice, many people will be able to travel to space.
Scientists were even more perplexed in 2018 when they performed the most precise measurement of antimatter to date and confirmed that antimatter and matter behave nearly identically. The discovery implies that particles and their inverses should have been created in equal quantities at the beginning of the Universe. However, if true, the fact that matter successes over antimatter becomes increasingly challenging to understand.
Researchers are still looking for the criterion that explains matter's dominance over antimatter in our Universe. Calculations indicate that there was a slight imbalance in particle and antiparticle numbers just after the Big Bang, when particles and antiparticles annihilated one another. Less than one out of every billion ordinary particles survived the collision and went on to form all of the matter we see around us today. Our very existence hinges on the slight prevalence of matter over antimatter in the early universe. Yet, as we gaze into the future, it is evident that antimatter holds a wealth of promising potential uses.
The next step in antiparticle applications is to manufacture and store anti-hydrogen in positrons and antiprotons. Storing antimatter is difficult due to its lack of electric charge and magnetically opposing properties, but scientists have proposed several suggestions for preserving and storing it, including using an ultraviolet laser beam and magnetic fields to push it away. Magnetic field can be used to trap anti-hydrogen in snowballs, similar to hydrogen.
In the future, antimatter will be used to create shadows within the body. This new type of imaging has many advantages over existing methods, as the amount of radiation to which the patient is exposed is a hundred times lower. However, this method can be used to completely destroy cancerous tumors.
The most important future application of antimatter will be as a fuel in rocket propulsion engines. To put it simply, this application involves pumping antiprotons into a flask filled with hydrogen gas in a cylinder that serves as a boiler, where the hydrogen reacts with the antiprotons to produce Gamma rays. The energy produced by this reaction will be used to propel the missile; this method of propulsion increases the speed by two or three times when compared to the current chemical propulsion missiles.
Because of the small size of the rocket engine and the low mass of the fuel in relation to the mass of the rocket if antimatter is used as fuel, this application is economical for both near and far travels from Earth.
Traps containing antiprotons will travel around the world in the coming years, not only for scientific research but also for practical applications in medicine. The antimatter will be stored in specially designed facilities.
As the twenty-first century progresses, antimatter will find more and more applications: its production will rise, lowering its price. Then, because a few grams of antimatter will suffice, many people will be able to travel to space.
