Matter Antimatter Physics

[Mofo1995]

So, I was talking about physics with a lab assistant and we came around the subject of matter antimatter reactions. The assistant asked me if this has been done, and well, I didn't have an answer. I know that it takes an astonishingly long amount of time to create antimatter through particle colliders, but it stands to reckon that a large galactic force with technological sophistication like the sol alliance, or the skrell, could have theoretically gathered enough antimatter to actually make a matter-antimatter bomb. So, has it been done?

[Rusty Shackleford]

One word.

Plasma.

It makes all your dreams come true.

[Guest Marlon Phoenix]

Exotic weapons of galactic destruction or planet-ending annihilation aren't really the focus of the lore or the setting that we have. We still need some IC justification, so I'll say:

1) Trying to make such a weapon would violate so many galactic laws and the Luna Convention that it'd make even the most paperwork happy HoP balk.

2) There's absolutely no scenario where the Sol Alliance or Jargon Federation would use this kind of weapon, barring the discovery of an entire planet of mecha-hitler spider zombies. Your voting bases tends to be upset if your recent airstrike caused collateral damage in the millions.

3) The Sol Alliance can't afford justifying it economically when plasma is cheaper to make bombs with. You don't understand how penny-pinching the SA is.

[Mofo1995]

Exotic weapons of galactic destruction or planet-ending annihilation aren't really the focus of the lore or the setting that we have. We still need some IC justification, so I'll say:

1) Trying to make such a weapon would violate so many galactic laws and the Luna Convention that it'd make even the most paperwork happy HoP balk.

2) There's absolutely no scenario where the Sol Alliance or Jargon Federation would use this kind of weapon, barring the discovery of an entire planet of mecha-hitler spider zombies. Your voting bases tends to be upset if your recent airstrike caused collateral damage in the millions.

3) The Sol Alliance can't afford justifying it economically when plasma is cheaper to make bombs with. You don't understand how penny-pinching the SA is.

All right, I just figured I'd ask. There's just a lot of flexibility with these types of things since you can know exactly how much energy would be in your explosion. It wouldn't necessarily have to be planet ending, as just half a kilogram of antimatter reacting with half a kilogram of its matter equivalent would be about 21 Megatons, which is less than half the yield of the Tsara Bomba. And such an explosion wouldn't leave behind all those pesky radioactive isotopes for long term damage like a nuclear bomb does. The penny pinching part makes the very most sense, but already there are thousands of particle accelerators in operation, with antimatter as a natural byproduct if they're in the business of particle colliding. What are the limits of the Luna Convention?

Edit: 30,000 accelerator facilities in operation today, not including accelerators like, say, CRTs. Much like most E&M research is completed today, theoretically most research that could be gained by accelerating particles could be done in the future, making the maintenance and usage of particle accelerators largely pointless. But that's speculation.

[Gollee]

It's less than half the explosive yield of the Tsar Bomba, but it isn't the explosion that kills planets, it's the utter collapse of the biosphere following such a massive radiation release; unlike the Tsar Bomba, annihilation reactions release purely radiative energy, likely spreading immense amounts of highly radioactive isotopes across the planet; as well as immediately killing all lifeforms within a much larger area than a conventional weapon, as the radiation is much more intense.

Antimatter is a natural byproduct of our current experiments, but it would take CERN 2 million years to produce one gram of Antimatter.

Not only that, we can only contain said antimatter for 16 minutes, currently; and unlike a nuclear weapon, when an antimatter weapon malfunctions, it doesn't become inert, it goes bang, they are fairdangerous weapons, not failsafe.

[Mofo1995]

It's less than half the explosive yield of the Tsar Bomba, but it isn't the explosion that kills planets, it's the utter collapse of the biosphere following such a massive radiation release; unlike the Tsar Bomba, annihilation reactions release purely radiative energy, likely spreading immense amounts of highly radioactive isotopes across the planet; as well as immediately killing all lifeforms within a much larger area than a conventional weapon, as the radiation is much more intense.

Antimatter is a natural byproduct of our current experiments, but it would take CERN 2 million years to produce one gram of Antimatter.

Not only that, we can only contain said antimatter for 16 minutes, currently; and unlike a nuclear weapon, when an antimatter weapon malfunctions, it doesn't become inert, it goes bang, they are fairdangerous weapons, not failsafe.

 

All right, I suppose I didn't know as much about antimatter. Yeah, I knew it would take an unfeasible amount of time, but with the marvels of the future, I didn't really know what technological capabilities everyone possessed. In light of all this, it makes a plenty of sense that it hasn't been done, and is rather unfeasible.

Thanks everyone for the responses!

[Guest Marlon Phoenix]

Marking as answered and archiving!