this coudl solve all world energy problems...

ANTIMATTER

Some facts about the birthplace of antimatter...
European Laboratory for Particle Physics (CERN)

Antimatter is routinely produced at CERN (more than 10 million particles per second.)
The World-wide Web was invented at CERN. The world's largest magnet, weighing more than the Eiffel tower, is at CERN. CERN's biggest accelerator is 27 kilometers around, and particles travelling near the speed of light lap it over 11,000 times each second.

PRESS RELEASE

Copyright © 1996 Reuters Information Service

European scientists create first antimatter atoms GENEVA (Jan 4, 1996 7:04 p.m. EST) - European scientists have managed to create fleeting atoms of antimatter for the first time, bringing a dream of science fiction a step closer to fact.

The European Laboratory for Particle Physics (CERN) said Thursday nine anti-hydrogen atoms were created in experiments last September, although each lasted only about 40 billionths of a second before being annihilated by ordinary matter.

"If you watch 'Star Trek', you'll know the USS Enterprise was driven by antimatter power," said CERN spokesman Neil Calder in a reference to the U.S. cult television series. "We're not there yet, but this is a major step."

Physicists have known about or suspected the existence of antimatter for more than 60 years and the first anti-particles were created in laboratories in the 1950s.

But they had never been able to bring those particles together to form actual atoms of antimatter.

The experiments at CERN, which straddles the Franco-Swiss border by Geneva, were conducted by a team led by German Professor Walter Oelert of Nuremberg University and including scientists from the University of Genoa in Italy.

Since the gas hydrogen has the simplest atom of all, consisting of a proton and a single electron, they set out to create anti-hydrogen by combining an antiproton with an anti-electron or positron.

The team whirled previously created antiprotons through a underground circular atom smasher, passing them through a xenon gas jet every time they passed around -- about three million times a second.

Very occasionally, CERN said in a communiqué, an antiproton converted a small part of its energy into an electron and positron while passing through a xenon atom.

"In even rarer cases, the positron's velocity was sufficiently close to the velocity of the antiproton for the two particles to join -- creating an atom of anti-hydrogen," it added.

During a three-week period, nine anti-hydrogen atoms were created in collisions between antiprotons and xenon atoms. Each one existed for only 40 billionths of a second, traveling at nearly the speed of light for about 33 feet before being annihilated or canceled out by ordinary matter.

The only sign the scientists had that the anti-atoms had ever existed was the energy produced by the annihilation. Science fiction writers have long considered the explosion of matter and antimatter to be the energy source of the future.

Calder said CERN had not wanted to release Oelert's findings until they had been "checked, double-checked and triple-checked" by other scientists and accepted for publication in a respected physics journal.

CERN specialists say the next step is to develop techniques to store antimatter for seconds, minutes or weeks. They could then compare anti-hydrogen atoms with ordinary hydrogen atoms.

Because antimatter technology is changing so rapidly, links provided here would become outdated almost overnight. For the most recent information on this topic, enter "antimatter" into your favorite search engine.

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