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  Antimatter cleans up its actJan 06, 2011 1:56 AM PST | url
 
Added 1 new A* page:You may recall me talking a little while back about the ALPHA experiment at CERN having trapped antihydrogen (simple antimatter) molecules. Now thanks to advances in the Internet you can watch a video instead of having to read me making a hash of it; here's ALPHA's spokesman Jeffrey Hangst describing the antihydrogen trap:
 
[Edit 5/26/18: video no longer on YouTube]
 
He mentions that ALPHA is staffed by 40 scientists—probably not all full-time, I guess?—and has an annual budget of "a few hundred thousand" Swiss Francs; Swiss Francs are running about 1:1 with the Dollar, so...that's a tiny budget! For some of the most cutting-edge science on the planet! Gosh.
 
This Sixty Symbols video has various University of Nottingham professors talking about the antihydrogen trapping; among other things, they point out that antimatter is used in PET (positron emission tomography) scanners: the neat rainbow-colored images produced of things inside people's bodies
 
Image
image by Jens Langner (source)
 
are actually showing positrons (antimatter versions of electrons), produced by radioactive decay of an ingested/injected/whatever radionuclide, annihilating with matter in the body. That sounds bad/painful, but I guess it's in such small amounts that you don't even notice. So, hurrah for antimatter!
 
 
 
 
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