CERN confines antimatter for just over 16 minutes

William Atkins
Monday, 06 June 2011 22:29

Science - Energy

Scientists working with the ALPHA Experiment at CERN have accomplished what no one else has been able to do before: trap antimatter (specifically, anti-hydrogen) for at least 1,005 seconds.

The paper written by this team of researchers was published on June 5, 2011, within the journal Nature Physics. It is entitled 'Confinement of antihydrogen for 1,000 seconds.'

CERN is the abbreviation for the European Organization for Nuclear Research, which is located in Geneva, Switzerland. The main CERN website also has an article on this major accomplishment.

They state in the abstract to their paper: 'Here, we report the observation of anti-atom confinement for 1,000'‰s [seconds], extending our earlier results by nearly four orders of magnitude. Our calculations indicate that most of the trapped anti-atoms reach the ground state.'

And, 'Further, we report the first measurement of the energy distribution of trapped antihydrogen, which, coupled with detailed comparisons with simulations, provides a key tool for the systematic investigation of trapping dynamics. These advances open up a range of experimental possibilities, including precision studies of charge-parity-time reversal symmetry and cooling to temperatures where gravitational effects could become apparent.'

In other words, these scientists have contained antimatter for just over 16 minutes. And, in doing so, are now able to study its features in detail.

Antimatter is the counterpart to matter, which is what we are made of and what most other things are made of, too.

Specifically, anti-hydrogen atoms have the same mass as hydrogen atoms, but with an opposite charge. It is difficult to trap antimatter because if any of it contacts regular matter, they annihilate each other. Boom! They are both destroyed!

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