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Mystery Deepens: Matter and Antimatter Are Mirror Images
Live Science ^ | Charles Q. Choi

Posted on 08/14/2015 9:14:59 AM PDT by BenLurkin

Matter and antimatter appear to be perfect mirror images of each other as far as anyone can see, scientists have discovered with unprecedented precision, foiling hope of solving the mystery as to why there is far more matter than antimatter in the universe.

Everyday matter is made up of protons, neutrons or electrons. These particles have counterparts known as antiparticles — antiprotons, antineutrons and positrons, respectively — that have the same mass but the opposite electric charge. (Although neutrons and antineutrons are both neutrally charged, they are each made of particles known as quarks that possess fractional electrical charges, and the charges of these quarks are equal and opposite to one another in neutrons and antineutrons.)

The known universe is composed of everyday matter. The profound mystery is, why the universe is not made up of equal parts antimatter, since the Big Bang that is thought to have created the universe 13.7 billion years ago produced equal amounts of both. And if matter and antimatter appear to be mirror images of each other in every respect save their electrical charge, there might not be much any of either type of matter left — matter and antimatter annihilate when they encounter each other

(Excerpt) Read more at livescience.com ...


TOPICS: Science
KEYWORDS: antimatter; stringtheory
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To: BenLurkin

Curious article. They discuss it as if it is a totally new concept, but this has been a cosmology topic for a long time. The balance (or lack thereof) between antimatter and matter was already part of science fiction stories in the 1950s. Mr. Spock even commented in a Star Trek episode about the mystery of the missing antimatter in the universe in the 1960s tv show. I attended astrophysics lectures that covered the issue in the early 1970s.


21 posted on 08/14/2015 10:35:07 AM PDT by Kirkwood (Zombie Hunter)
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To: BenLurkin

Not quite identical.

In the anti-universe, Spock has a beard.


22 posted on 08/14/2015 10:44:50 AM PDT by left that other site (You shall know the Truth, and The Truth Shall Set You Free.)
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To: Kirkwood

And Kirk has a “roommate”


23 posted on 08/14/2015 10:48:51 AM PDT by BenLurkin (The above is not a statement of fact. It is either satire or opinion. Or both.)
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To: BenLurkin

A simplistic answer to the riddle is:
‘nature abhors a vacuum.’

Since it is at the ‘quark level’, that the ‘charged fields’ can be measured, either positive or negative, and the measured quantities of positives outnumbered the negatives, the ‘null’ fields must be the areas where they have NOT ‘canceled each other out to nothingness’, but must be in perfect numerical equilibrium, and therefore neither polarity is the greater field.

A simple bar magnet has polarized ends along the long line of the bar. But what does the middle of the bar register?
Equilibrium.


24 posted on 08/14/2015 11:06:57 AM PDT by Terry L Smith
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To: BenLurkin

Hope they try to create some antimatter in the laboratory. They will get a Nobel prize, posthumously.


25 posted on 08/14/2015 11:16:15 AM PDT by I want the USA back (Media: completely irresponsible. Complicit in the destruction of this country)
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To: I want the USA back

It’s been done: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/11/081117193019.htm


26 posted on 08/14/2015 11:24:02 AM PDT by BenLurkin (The above is not a statement of fact. It is either satire or opinion. Or both.)
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To: Flag_This

27 posted on 08/14/2015 11:38:30 AM PDT by KosmicKitty (Liberals claim to want to hear other views, but then are shocked to discover there are other views)
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To: Little Ray
there was a slight imbalance between matter and anti-matter when the Big Bang happened.

A black hole colliding with an anti-black hole would cause a hellacious big bang. If the collision was off center the explosion would be asymmetrical.

28 posted on 08/14/2015 11:49:33 AM PDT by Reeses (A journey of a thousand miles begins with a government pat down.)
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To: 6SJ7; AdmSmith; AFPhys; Arkinsaw; allmost; aristotleman; autumnraine; bajabaja; ...
Thanks BenLurkin.

· String Theory Ping List ·
721 posted on 04/24/2007 8:14:42 PM PDT by DocRock
· Join · Bookmark · Topics · Google ·
· View or Post in 'blog · post a topic · subscribe ·


29 posted on 08/14/2015 12:06:48 PM PDT by SunkenCiv (What do we want? REGIME CHANGE! When do we want it? NOW)
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To: Resettozero

No, silly. The problem is “matter privilege”, and must be eradicated.
If the lies read this story, the End is near.


30 posted on 08/14/2015 2:05:39 PM PDT by ImaGraftedBranch (If you haven't figured it out, there is a great falling away...happening before your eyes.)
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To: ImaGraftedBranch

Libs


31 posted on 08/14/2015 2:06:45 PM PDT by ImaGraftedBranch (If you haven't figured it out, there is a great falling away...happening before your eyes.)
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To: ImaGraftedBranch
If the lies read this story, the End is near.

THAT'S what I've been trying to tell people. But will they listen? Nooooooo.

(Wish I actually knew what you were telling me.)
32 posted on 08/14/2015 2:07:59 PM PDT by Resettozero
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To: ImaGraftedBranch

Oh. Da libs. Now we are on adjacent and sometimes overlapping wavelengths!


33 posted on 08/14/2015 2:09:21 PM PDT by Resettozero
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To: BenLurkin

Hmmm...wondering if gravity is a property of matter, is anti-gravity a property of anti-matter? Universes would flee their anti-counterparts.


34 posted on 08/14/2015 2:10:53 PM PDT by stboz
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To: tet68
“At this point what does it anti-matter?”

Said by Herself.

My nomination for Post of the Week.

35 posted on 08/15/2015 3:40:44 AM PDT by samtheman (Trump/Cruz '16)
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To: PIF
During the first few microseconds of the Big Bang, various entities of matter and antimatter fought a war: the antimatter folks lost.

That is precisely the answer. I'm surprised the writers of the article don't seem to get that. Read Alan Guth. Back in the 80s he and others postulated a slight asymmetry in the huge amount of stuff of the big bang: 50.00001% of it matter, 49.99999% of it antimatter. 99.99999% of all stuff annihilated and the remaining .00001% (which is all the galaxies in the known universe today) is the leftover matter from the slight imbalance.

If there were equal amounts of antimatter and matter today (as the article seems to yearn for), then there very soon there would be nothing.

Matter + antimatter -> annihilation -> nothing.

I guess they are saying we should be able to see whole galaxies of antimatter? Would we be able to see them and know that they are antimatter?

36 posted on 08/15/2015 3:56:07 AM PDT by samtheman (Trump/Cruz '16)
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To: samtheman

See the Xeelee series by Stephen Baxter, specifically “Transcendent.”

You will know those galaxies are antimatter when matter touches them ... keep a sharp eye out, the antimatter folks may be planning something big to revenge themselves.


37 posted on 08/15/2015 5:45:00 AM PDT by PIF (They came for me and mine ... now it is your turn ...)
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To: PIF

I loved the Xeelee stories. Great SF.


38 posted on 08/15/2015 5:45:50 AM PDT by samtheman (Trump/Cruz '16)
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