History Main / Antimatter

All this radiation is many times more powerful, relative to mass, than nuclear fusion, making it the purest example of UsefulNotes/AlbertEinstein's famous equation E=mc
. Based on this, we can calculate how ridiculously powerful it is:
* Remember that the speed of light (the ''c'' in the equation) is 3×10[[superscript:8]] m/s.
* c
= 9×10[[superscript:16]] m
/s
. Converting 1 gram of matter to energy therefore produces 9×10[[superscript:13]] kg×m
/s
.
* 9×10[[superscript:13]] N×m is approximately 90 terajoules.

* In ''Fanfic/RocketshipVoyager'', the eponymous rocketship is a contraterrene-powered torchship. As in the ''Seetee'' stories by Creator/JackWilliamson, CT is mined in the Asteroid Belt and ''Voyager'' happens to be carrying a large supply back to Earth confined in an electromagnetic field-trap. [[spoiler:This serves as a ChekhovsGun when the crew need a WeaponOfMassDestruction to escape the Psiborg Collective.]] In one scene the Chief Engineer has his hand on a [[BigRedButton red lever]] which will eject the entire Cochrane Drive if needed, but knows that if the electromagnetic fields falter for so much as a microsecond, they'd all be obliterated before he could even think of pulling it.

ScienceMarchesOn with antimatter as it does with pretty much everything, so you might see some outdated "science" in your stories. For instance, it was once theorised that antimatter ''did'' exist in large quantities somewhere out in the far reaches of space -- it was just undetectable. Modern science considers this unlikely, because it would be difficult for that much antimatter to exist in the universe without coming into contact with matter and violently proving its existence. But on the flip side, scientists are befuddled as to why there's so much matter in the universe compared to antimatter when all known processes for creating such massive particles, like the Big Bang, should create matter and antimatter in equal measure. Who knows? We might find a solution to that, too. It just gives the writers a lot of room to work with, and frustrates creators working on the harder end of the MohsScaleOfSciFiHardness.

A classic staple of science fiction and superhero stories, [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antimatter anti-matter]] is matter composed of antiparticles, subatomic particles that have mostly exactly the same properties (mass, intrinsic angular momentum, etc) as your everyday particles, but some properties are inverted: antiprotons have a negative electric charge, antielectrons (also known as positrons) have a positive charge, antineutrons and antiprotons have negative baryon numbers, etc. In some cases (photons, neutral pions) the particle is its own antiparticle.

Antiparticles do exist naturally; however, antimatter normally only exists for brief moments before coming in contact with normal matter, and it can only be formed as a product of radioactive decay, or when particles collide at very high speeds. When electrons encounter positrons, both particles mutually annihilate and emit gamma radiation. At high energy, they can also produce other stuff. When protons and neutrons encounter antiprotons and antineutrons, they also annihilate, resulting in a star of pions shooting out. These ultimately decay into high-energy gamma radiation. The result of all this pure energy unleashed from mass is many times more powerful than nuclear fusion (relative to its mass; it's the purest example of Einstein's famous equation E = mc[[superscript:2]]). Antimatter is often used as either a fuel or a weapon in fiction, both cases due to its high energy potential.

How high energy? Remember that the speed of light in a vacuum (the 'c' in this equation) is 3.00*10[[superscript:8]] m/s. c[[superscript:2]] is 9.00*10[[superscript:16]] m[[superscript:2]]/s[[superscript:2]]. Converting 1 gram of matter to energy therefore produces 9.00*10[[superscript:13]] kg*m[[superscript:2]]/s[[superscript:2]] = 9.00*10[[superscript:13]] N*m ~= 90 terajoules. "Little Boy", the nuclear weapon used against [[HiroshimaAsAUnitOfMeasure Hiroshima]] in 1945, was built from ''64 kilograms'' of uranium and released only 63 terajoules.

As noted on the KineticWeaponsAreJustBetter page, you have to get something of mass ''m'' whipped up to .87 ''c'' [[note]]Approximately 260,000 km/s.[[/note]] to have the same amount of energy as a matter/antimatter reaction where both the matter and antimatter that you're annihilating have a combined mass of ''m''.

This explosive aspect of antimatter is also often explored, usually in the form of [[EarthShatteringKaboom planet-annihilating weapons of mass destruction]].[[note]]Just don't expect the writers to realize [[TheAirNotThere the air is matter.]][[/note]] Alternatively, controlled matter/anti-matter reactions could be used as a source of power: given that it does not naturally occur in useful quantities, it would be something like an ultimate battery - with massed solar or nuclear power or particle accelerators powered by [[DysonSphere Dyson solar satellite systems]] throughout the Milky Way producing the energy needed to synthesize large quantities of antimatter for use as fuel for FasterThanLightTravel, weapons, {{matter replicat|or}}ion, or any application needing very high energy/power density. Just don't buy into anyone trying to sell you on the idea of antimatter power plants; these are little more than highly-explosive perpetual motion machines.

Antimatter is also an easy plot device when you need an epic disaster to royally mess up a suitably large object like, oh, a planet. Some scientists are playing with antimatter in order to try to exploit its awesome energy density, a little "oops" happens and voila, instant post-apocalyptic scenario in which to set your story. Bonus: TheEndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt being caused by antimatter instead of nuclear bombs - the other typical cause for anything post-apocalyptic - neatly removes the problem of radiation, which is often difficult to narrate around.

One of the big mysteries concerning the Big Bang has been why there is so much matter in the universe but not nearly as much antimatter, since all known processes for creating massive particles create both in equal quantities. The weak interaction (that describes processes like beta radioactive decay and such -- it's also where the now famous Higgs mechanism takes place) explains how there might be a small imbalance in the amounts of matter and antimatter, but that imbalance is not nearly enough to explain the existence of... nearly everything we care about. The strong interaction (that describes how protons can stick together in a nucleus even if they have positive charge) would be a nice candidate to do it, but that's much more easily said than done. It was formerly hypothesized that parts of the universe ''do'' consist entirely of antimatter but are simply too far away from Earth to be detected, but this is now considered unlikely (though given the uncertainty about the size of the universe, not impossible). It's also been suggested that some parts of the universe we ''can'' detect might consist entirely of antimatter and we simply can't tell, because antimatter doesn't behave that different from matter if the two aren't coming into contact. This is also seen as unlikely, because if an entire galaxy were made out of antimatter it would eventually come into contact with a matter galaxy. Even if stars and planets will virtually never come into contact with each other during a galactic "collision", the same cannot be said of the respective galaxies' interstellar medium (all of the hydrogen and trace amounts of other gasses that exist between star systems). Nor can it be said of the supermassive black holes at the center of almost all galaxies. The collision of a supermassive black hole with its antimatter counterpart would produce the biggest explosion ''since'' the Big Bang, and the evidence of such an event would be impossible to miss. Yet another suggestion is that [[AlternateUniverse the universe split in two]] immediately after the Big Bang, with our half getting almost all of the matter and the other getting almost all of the antimatter. At our current level of science we can't even guess how likely or unlikely that is.[[note]]Indeed, it's questionable whether that idea even counts as a hypothesis, since unless somebody invents interdimensional travel it's impossible to even test.[[/note]] So, yeah, we have no idea.

Don't hold your breath waiting for those marvelous feats of technology, by the way: antimatter is currently the most expensive stuff on Earth, priced at about $62.5 trillion a gram[[note]]For the sake of perspective, that amount of money represents just short of the total annual economic output of the ''entire world''[[/note]]. Not that a gram of antimatter was ever produced -- in fact, so far we don't know how to effectively store it. Put it in any regular container and it would annihilate against its walls. No good. Powerful electromagnetic traps have been devised, but those can only store a billion antiprotons or so. That's one millionth of a billionth of a gram. Ish. More than this would be difficult because all these antiprotons have negative charge, and hate being close to each other. Alternatively, we could store antihydrogen atoms which are electrically neutral, but that also makes those electromagnetic traps much more difficult to use. Still, scientists have been able to store 309 antihydrogen atoms for more than 1000 seconds. Now all we need to do is store one trillion billion (ish) times more hydrogen. No small feat -- but ScienceMarchesOn.

Of course, instances in which a series gets the known properties of antimatter [[ArtisticLicensePhysics completely wrong]] are also not uncommon.

A common form of {{Unobtainium}}.

** Typically, it is used as a fuel to power [[FasterThanLightTravel warp drives]] and other energy-intensive apparati aboard a starship (such as energy weapons, [[DeflectorShields shields]], {{matter replicator}}s, and base power load for the whole ship). According to the ''Star Trek: The Next Generation Technical Manual'', the warp drive is powered by colliding beams of deuterium[[note]]Deuterium is more commonly known as "heavy hydrogen"[[/note]] and anti-deuterium, regulated by a shaped [[{{Unobtainium}} dilithium]] [[PowerCrystal crystal]] under extreme heat and pressure into an energy form that can be harnessed.

* In ''Literature/ExSuperheroes'', a Japanese supervillain has the ability to generate antimatter near his body and manipulate it. He has learned to use it to throw deadly projectiles as well as to fly (by generating it under his feet and using it as rocket boots). He is immune to his own antimatter. He can also keep it isolated from normal matter in order to avoid it detonating prematurely. He calls himself Antimatter or Tanmonishitsu ("antimatter" in Japanese).

* In the ''Literature/StarChallenge'' books, negatron[[note]]An alternate name for the anti-proton, even if ''electrons'' are also often named so[[/note]] torpedoes and missiles are used as weapon by spacecrafts. There's also a mentionn of anti-matter charges, which are used like the former to cause a [[ArtisticLicenseAstronomy star to flare and suddenly implode into a black hole]].

* Antimatter is used in explosives in ''Webcomic/SchlockMercenary'', usually consisting of minuscule amounts of antimatter encased in fullerene molecules -- breaking these up will cause a massive explosion. Most notably, a minor character once smuggled antimatter out of a facility in paper bags and unwittingly almost caused an entire habitat to blow up. Resident MadScientist Kevyn turned his uniform insignia into a pair of antimatter grenades, [[httpS://www.schlockmercenary.com/2005-05-31 one of which]] uses some antimatter to penetrate DeflectorShields and the rest to blow up something the size of a tank, [[https://www.schlockmercenary.com/2005-06-04 the other]] destroyed an enemy base, and though indirectly, brought down ''a spaceship in orbit of the planet''. Antimatter is considered inferior as both a weapon and a fuel; it's fail-unsafe, warheads using it can't regulate their blast power the way an annie-plant[[note]]Neutronium-fueled gravitic-annihilation powerplant[[/note]] can, and neutronium for annie-plants is ''much'' easier to make.

** The main problem in the ''Seetee'' novels (contra-terrene=C.T.=seetee) is building a "bedplate" device that allows matter and antimatter to play nice together through [[AntiGravity paragravity effects,]] so they can build a refinery for antimatter ores, antimatter pickaxes with regular handles, etc (antimatter acts just like regular matter, forming planets, asteroids, and suchlike). While a "permanent paragravity magnet" is theoretically possible, nobody can figure out what metal will hold the charge forever. At least until the protagonist finds a FlyingSaucer that's 50% terrene and contraterrene, thst is...

* Antimatter is used in explosives in ''Webcomic/SchlockMercenary'', usually consisting of minuscule amounts of antimatter encased in fullerene molecules -- breaking these up will cause a massive explosion. Most notably, a minor character once smuggled antimatter out of a facility in paper bags and unwittingly almost caused an entire habitat to blow up. Resident MadScientist Kevyn turned his uniform insignia into a pair of antimatter grenades, [[http://www.schlockmercenary.com/2005-05-31 one of which]] uses some antimatter to penetrate DeflectorShields and the rest to blow up something the size of a tank, [[http://www.schlockmercenary.com/d/20050604.html the other]] destroyed an enemy base, and though indirectly, brought down ''a spaceship in orbit of the planet''. Antimatter is considered inferior as both a weapon and a fuel; it's fail-unsafe, warheads using it can't regulate their blast power the way an annie-plant[[note]]Neutronium-fueled gravitic-annihilation powerplant[[/note]] can, and neutronium for annie-plants is ''much'' easier to make.

* Creator/GregBear's Forge of God has the Earth destroyed by two mass, one of neutronium and the other of anti-neutronium. These orbit the earth, inside it, until they meet. The anti-neutronium one does cause some problems from the energy released as it plows through the inside of the Earth, but once the two masses collide, the energy released is [[EndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt greater than Earth's gravitation binding energy]]. In its sequel Anvil of Stars, some fighter ships, and pilots, are turned to anti-matter by the baddies. They figured it out when one tried to dock with the main ship. The others slowly died because anti-matter isn't suited for living things, but they hung around long enough for the protagonist's love interest to say [[TearJerker good-bye]].

** You are being bombarded by billions of neutrinos each day. From your birth day, over a decade might have spanned before your body interacted with a single neutrino.

Don't hold your breath waiting for such marvelous feats of technology, however: antimatter is currently the most expensive stuff on Earth, priced at about $62.5 trillion a gram[[note]]For the sake of perspective, that amount of money represents just short of the total annual economic output of the ''entire world''[[/note]]. Not that a gram of antimatter was ever produced -- in fact, so far we don't know how to effectively store it. Put it in any regular container and it would annihilate against its walls. No good. Powerful electromagnetic traps have been devised, but those can only store a billion antiprotons or so. That's one millionth of a billionth of a gram. Ish. More than this would be difficult because all these antiprotons have negative charge, and hate being close to each other. Alternatively, we could store antihydrogen atoms which are electrically neutral, but that also makes those electromagnetic traps much more difficult to use. Still, scientists have been able to store 309 antihydrogen atoms for more than 1000 seconds. Now all we need to do is store one trillion billion (ish) times more hydrogen. No small feat -- but ScienceMarchesOn.

* In ''ComicBook/YokoTsuno'', antimatter plays a big part of ''The Time Spiral''. During the 3rd millenium antimatter was used in warfare and the Earth's continents were destroyed, leaving nothing but a ball of magma filled with toxic gas. The last living human on Earth tries to undo this [[SetRightWhatOnceWentWrong by travelling to the 20th century and stop a man from discovering the antimatter.]]

* In ''ComicBook/YokoTsuno'', antimatter plays a big part of ''The Time Spiral''. During the 3rd millenium antimatter was used in warfare and the Earth's continents were destroyed, leaving nothing but a ball of magma filled with toxic gas. The last living human on Earth tries to undo this [SetRightWhatOnceWentWrong by travelling to the 20th century and stop a man from discovering the antimatter.]]

One of the big mysteries concerning the Big Bang has been why there is so much matter in the universe but not nearly as much antimatter, since all known processes for creating massive particles create both in equal quantities. The weak interaction (that describes processes like beta radioactive decay and such -- it's also where the now famous Higgs mechanism takes place) explains how there might be a small imbalance in the amounts of matter and antimatter, but that imbalance is not nearly enough to explain the existence of... nearly everything we care about. The strong interaction (that describes how protons can stick together in a nucleus even if they have positive charge) would be a nice candidate to do it, but that's much more easily said than done. It was formerly hypothesized that parts of the universe ''do'' consist entirely of antimatter but are simply too far away from Earth to be detected, but this is now considered unlikely (though given the uncertainty about the size of the universe, not impossible). So, yeah, we have no idea.

** The last novel of the series has humans bombarding planets from orbit using antimatter weapons. It takes an hour for a cruiser armed with two turret-mounted annihilators to turn an Earth-like world into a charred rock. The book specifically mentions that this is almost never done, though, as Earth-like worlds are rare, and nobody likes wasting them. The only reason this is done is in an attempt to stop a war with a race of [[TheReptilians [=Reptilians=]]] by destroying their leaders (they are hardwired from birth to obey a strict hierarchy).

* Starships in ''LightNovel/CrestOfTheStars'' use antimatter as fuel, much as in ''Franchise/StarTrek''. Warships can also be equipped with anti-proton beams as defensive weaponry. The reason they're classified as ''defensive'' weapons is that, antimatter or not, they're very weak compared to the explosive, self-propelled mines or giant railguns that see more use, and thus are mostly used for shooting down incoming mines.

* The Mondays, the evil versions of ''WesternAnimation/TheSecretSaturdays'', supposedly come from an antimatter MirrorUniverse, which somehow has "corrupted" laws of physics. Matter from the two universes violently exploding on contact only occurs when [[spoiler: Argost absorbs the antimatter powers of Zak Monday [[MutuallyExclusiveMagic and the matter powers]] of Zak Saturday, despite Zak's warnings not to do so.]] [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WcFGem3t4Fs He should've listened.]]

As noted on the KineticWeaponsAreJustBetter page, you have to get something of mass ''m'' whipped up to .94 ''c'' [[note]]Approximately 282,000 km/s.[[/note]] to have the same amount of energy as a matter/antimatter reaction where both the matter and antimatter that you're annihilating have a combined mass of ''m''.

As noted on the KineticWeaponsAreJustBetter page, you have to get something of mass ''m'' whipped up to .87 ''c'' [[note]]Approximately 260,000 km/s in vacuum.[[/note]] to have the same amount of energy as a matter/antimatter reaction where both the matter and antimatter that you're annihilating have a combined mass of ''m''.

* The old [[StarTrekTextGame EgaTrek]] has a M-AM (matter-antimatter) converter as one of the [[SubsystemDamage systems that can be damaged on the USS Enterprise.

** The large bomb that the turians plant on Tuchanka seems to utilize antimatter, as its yield to weight ratio is outright impossible for a regular fusion weapon (which caps out at below 10 kilotons per kilogram of bomb weight). To wit, it kills every living thing in a 500 kilometer radius if it goes off. To get a near-100% death rate against regular humans at that distance (much less the residents of [[WorldOfBadass Tuchanka]]) would require [[https://nuclearsecrecy.com/nukemap/classic/ about 7.2 teratons of TNT equivalent]], or [[HiroshimaAsAUnitOfMeasure five hundred million times the yield of the Hiroshima bomb]]. You can see why the stuff is so highly regulated.