Wednesday, May 04, 2011

ALPHA Team Traps Antimatter for a Record-setting Time


The Antihydrogen Laser Physics Apparatus (ALPHA) located in Switzerland has set a new record for capturing antihydrogen, a form of anti-matter, and storing it for a record setting 10,000 times longer than previous times. ALPHA's newest record is 1000 seconds or approximately sixteen minutes.

With the additional time, physicists can now study antimatter in general and antihydrogen specifically. Some of the crucial information that can be gained are:
  • Does antihydrogen have the same level of energy as normal hydrogen?
  • Is it an exact mirror image of matter and other fundamental questions.
Gizmodo article
Newscientist

2 comments:

Dave Tackett said...

Much longer than I would have guessed possible.

Beam Me Up said...

Aint it the truth Dave.
I would have bought a few hundred milliseconds longer than the previous attempt, a quarter of an hour seems totally unlikely.