09-22-2002, 06:00 PM
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Contributing Editor Emeritus
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 8,228
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FINALLY! Warp speed within our grasp!
http://news.com.com/2100-1001-958719.html
Ok, maybe I am being a bit optimistic, but this is the stuff of science fiction. "By corralling clouds of antimatter particles in a cylindrical chamber laced with detectors and electric and magnetic fields, the physicists assembled anti-hydrogen atoms, the looking glass equivalent of hydrogen, the most simple atom in nature. Whereas hydrogen consists of a positively charged proton circled by a negatively charged electron, in anti-hydrogen the proton's counterpart, a negatively charged anti-proton, is circled by an anti-electron, otherwise known as a positron. They then observed the flashes of energy when the new anti-hydrogen atoms annihilated themselves in collisions with ordinary matter in the walls of the chamber."
Next thing you know, we'll be crawling through Jeffries tubes aligning the EPS conduits to ensure the Bussard Collectors are operating within .92 of specs. The image is from Star Trek in Sound and Vision.
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09-22-2002, 06:10 PM
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Ponderer
Join Date: Jul 2003
Posts: 111
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Alas, I read in a related article that it takes something like 10,000 times more energy to make antimatter than you can get out of it. I have a feeling that this might stay in the realm of science fiction longer than most of us will be around...
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09-22-2002, 06:31 PM
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Thinker
Join Date: Jun 2002
Posts: 390
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Well. is not like they know how to contain the anti hydrogen yet. The practiclaly made the antihydrogen and watch it explodes after touching matter. The first person who can do this will be rich beyond imagination. (imagine boundless energy)
Of course the Army is already thinking about harvesting positron as a weapon energy, but they back down after seeing the tecnical intricacy and the cost with current technology.
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09-22-2002, 06:37 PM
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Contributing Editor Emeritus
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 8,228
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Quote:
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Originally Posted by mookie123
Well. is not like they know how to contain the anti hydrogen yet.
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Oh come on. We all know you use a magnetic containment field. :roll:
:lol:
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09-22-2002, 07:04 PM
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Pupil
Join Date: Nov 2006
Posts: 22
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Alas...
Alas...the "magnetic containment field" was one of Star Trek's booboos. Anti hydrogen, like all atoms, has a neutral charge. Now, if you just leave it as a soup of anti protons, now we're talkin'! 
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09-22-2002, 07:14 PM
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Contributing Editor Emeritus
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 8,228
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Re: Alas...
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Originally Posted by Bandersnatch
Anti hydrogen, like all atoms, has a neutral charge.
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Not when you focus them with di-lithium crystals. (you are not getting into the spirit of this thread. :wink: )
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09-22-2002, 07:34 PM
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Thinker
Join Date: Jun 2002
Posts: 390
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focusing atoms? so far we only able to focus, as in focusing stream of particle in coherent wave, a very limited type of atoms. Hydrogen isn't one of them most are Alkally ion vapor. And what's worst only until recently this "stream" of atoms are only blob and spurt that has to go in the direction of gravity. It more like dripping rather than shining light stream like Laser that you can focus into a crystal.
Well ok is not like we are making a warp drive here.... lol
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09-22-2002, 08:31 PM
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Intellectual
Join Date: Feb 2002
Posts: 117
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Quote:
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Originally Posted by Ed Hansberry
Quote:
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Originally Posted by mookie123
Well. is not like they know how to contain the anti hydrogen yet.
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Oh come on. We all know you use a magnetic containment field. :roll:
:lol: |
Reality is often stranger (more exciting) than SciFi; humans are an ingenious lot:
1) "Meta-stable" states of exotic atoms (Helium-4 with an electron replaced by an anti-proton at the
Low-Energy Antiproton Ring at CERN).
2) Neutral Atom Traps (in countless labs all over the world) use six
polarized laser beams (+x,-x,+y,-y,+z,-z) to slow down, trap and then move or otherwise manipulate neutral atoms.
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09-22-2002, 08:43 PM
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Ponderer
Join Date: May 2002
Posts: 105
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We'll, who'd have guessed there were so many Quantum physicists reading this boards just waiting for their chance to spring into action.
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09-22-2002, 08:49 PM
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Intellectual
Join Date: Feb 2002
Posts: 117
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Quote:
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Originally Posted by krisbrown
We'll, who'd have guessed there were so many Quantum physicists reading this boards just waiting for their chance to spring into action.
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Whoops!  ops:
Pardon me while I give the propeller on my cap another spin.
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