Scientists trap antimatter for nearly 17 minutes

Generic News 1994 Published by

Okay I'm going all Star Trek on you guys now. CERN researchers have managed to trap antihydrogen atoms for 16 minutes and 40 seconds at world's largest physics laboratory in Geneva, Switzerland. That's roughly 16 minutes and 40 seconds longer than the first attempt in 2010, which lasted for only 172 milliseconds.

How'd they pull it off for over 16 minutes? Physicists working on the ALPHA experiment at the world's largest particle physics laboratory in Geneva, Switzerland "loaded" the trap by producing "anti-atoms" (sounds so Ed Wood, no?). Those anti-atoms were created in a process that involved "merging cold plasmas." Okay, so antimatter is kind of like lightning



Share this content
Twitter Facebook Reddit WhatsApp Email Print