Antimatter

DOE, NASA testing fission reactor for spaceflight

Why don't we have warp drive yet? Well, because, according to "Star Trek" lore, inventor Zefram Cochrane hasn't been born yet.

Baby Zefram is due in about 20 years, but in the meantime NASA and the Department of Energy are working on something somewhat tantalizing if you're planning a deep-space probe.

Researchers including engineers from Los Alamos National Laboratory have demonstrated a nuclear reactor that could power spaceflight. It's nowhere near as powerful as NASA's conceptual antimatter engine--the Demonstration Using Flattop Fissions (DUFF) experiment produces just 24 watts of electricity. … Read more

Buzz Out Loud 1483: Apple's iCloud is really iSync (Podcast)

On today's show, an exhausted Molly and Brian Cooley wrap up the longest Apple keynote in years, and try to make sense of the things you can and can't accomplish with iCloud. Plus, the latest from Microsoft at E3, a little bit of cursory science news, and finally time for pizza. Phew.

CERN scientists trap antimatter

Physicists at CERN have taken a major step forward in antimatter research, according to the European science organization.

For the first time, scientists have managed to produce antimatter atoms and trap them using magnetic fields, the world's premier particle physics laboratory announced yesterday.

Learning how to trap the antimatter atoms, which were antihydrogen, will allow scientists from CERN's Alpha experiment to study the antiparticles, CERN told ZDNet UK yesterday. "This is a momentous step in the study of antimatter," Alpha experiment spokesman Jeffrey Hangst said.

Read more of "Cern scientists trap antimatter" at ZDNet … Read more

CERN to seek antimatter in space

The Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer, a module that will go into space to conduct particle physics experiments, is set to leave CERN for the Kennedy Space Center on Tuesday.

The AMS module is being prepared for its transportation to the space center in Florida on board a U.S. Air Force Galaxy transport aircraft, CERN--the European Organization for Nuclear Research--said in a statement Wednesday. Once launched, AMS-02 will operate as an external module on the International Space Station (ISS). It will look for antimatter and dark matter while measuring cosmic ray composition, in a series of experiments designed to complement the … Read more

California artist rebuilds world economy with antimatter

The overlap with the title of this blog, Matter/Antimatter, is completely coincidental, but since most meaningful events are coincidental, it makes perfect sense that it prompted San Francisco-based conceptual artist Jonathon Keats to send me a note pointing to his upcoming exhibition "The First Bank of Antimatter."

Keats' previous artistic enterprises include applying string theory to real estate development, and in the wake of global economic collapse, Keats is now introducing a hedge against future catastrophe by creating a mirror economy designed to skyrocket as world markets plummet: the first holistic response to the great recession.

"… Read more