Two new studies highlight the enigmatic nature of antimatter, revealing its potential role in both understanding the universe’s origins and unlocking the secrets of particle physics.
This week, two studies were published that shed light on the mysterious beginnings and possible applications of antimatter—a kind of stuff that defies the laws of ordinary matter.
According to one study, which was just published in JCAP, cosmic ray antinuclei may be a sign of a particular type of dark matter. Researchers outline a technique for locating and tracking nuclear reactors using antineutrinos generated by the reactors’ nuclear reactions in a different work that was published earlier this week in AIP Advances.
Antimatter is significant because it has the potential to shed light on basic cosmic puzzles, such as the reason why the universe is composed of matter rather than a balanced mixture of matter and antimatter. These investigations are part of a broader endeavour to unravel some of the greatest mysteries in physics, such as the nature of dark matter, physics at the smallest scales, and perhaps even the universe’s birth.
Antimatter is indeed matter, despite its name. It’s heavy. A class of particles known as antimatter has electrical charges that are the opposite of those of their regular counterparts. The antimatter equivalents of protons, which have a positive charge, and electrons, which have a negative charge, are positrons, which have a positive charge, and antiprotons, which have a negative charge.
Antimatter is not wholly distinct from the fundamental forces, despite the differences in particle charges. Scientists discovered last year that antimatter responds to gravity in the same manner as regular matter, supporting both Einstein and the Standard Model of Particle Physics.
Dark matter is a concept that is more akin to the notion of “antimatter” that you might be familiar with. It is massless and undetectable to all types of detectors that humanity has developed to yet. Even though the particle (or particles!) causing dark matter cannot be directly viewed, its gravitational effects are detectable, leading scientists to believe that dark matter exists.
The latest JCAP study, which suggests that the amount of antimatter identified by experiments is larger than it should be and that dark matter is the cause, fits in nicely with the idea of antimatter and dark matter.
It has been suggested that dark matter is caused by a few distinct particles as well as other, more unusual items. These include dark photons, which, despite their name, are more like axions than some pernicious form of light; primordial black holes, which would be tiny black holes formed at the beginning of the universe, floating through space; axions, a particle named after a laundry detergent; and MAssive Compact Halo Objects, or MACHOs.
