You CAN turn energy into matter!

Discussion in 'Science' started by wgabrie, Nov 9, 2014.

  1. wgabrie

    wgabrie Well-Known Member Donor

    Joined:
    May 31, 2011
    Messages:
    13,830
    Likes Received:
    3,054
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Gender:
    Male
    'Einstein Was Right: You Can Turn Energy Into Matter'
    Wow, great job by these folks. :smile:

    I didn't think something like this would happen, but here it is. Now they need help getting to work on it, someone still needs to test this stuff out, after all, and for that they need a particle collider that works with photons, not protons.

    So close and yet so far.
     
  2. One Mind

    One Mind Well-Known Member Past Donor

    Joined:
    Sep 26, 2014
    Messages:
    20,296
    Likes Received:
    7,744
    Trophy Points:
    113
    I thought matter consisted of at least a nucleus and one electron? Seems like they theoretically can turn a photon into only one part of what it takes to create matter from energy. But yeah, I guess just coming up with a theory as to how to create one part of matter from energy is a start. Creating a nucleus from energy with its ever growing number of parts is much more complicated, I would think.
     
  3. wgabrie

    wgabrie Well-Known Member Donor

    Joined:
    May 31, 2011
    Messages:
    13,830
    Likes Received:
    3,054
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Gender:
    Male
    Great question. I don't know. I assume they're going to just keep sending in photons and it's going to rain the ingredients of matter.
     
  4. 10A

    10A Chief Deplorable Past Donor

    Joined:
    Jan 10, 2013
    Messages:
    5,698
    Likes Received:
    1,006
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Gender:
    Male
    An atom requires a nucleus. Matter does not, but then it depends on your definition of matter. Matter isn't really a scientific term anymore, terms like mass and volume are more scientific.

    Electrons and positrons have mass, and if your definition of matter is mass, then they are matter. If your definition of matter includes volume then things get odd with a particle like the electron, and the electron probably does not have volume.

    If electrons and positrons aren't matter, do we consider them as energy like a photon? In my opinion no, photons are massless, while electrons and positrons have mass. However, as Einstein tells us, energy and mass are just different forms of each other.
     
  5. Anders Hoveland

    Anders Hoveland Banned

    Joined:
    Apr 27, 2011
    Messages:
    11,044
    Likes Received:
    138
    Trophy Points:
    0
    This is fairly old news.

    Unfortunately, a particle is always created with its anti-particle, so you cannot really get all that energy out of matter without some anti-matter to go with it.
     
  6. One Mind

    One Mind Well-Known Member Past Donor

    Joined:
    Sep 26, 2014
    Messages:
    20,296
    Likes Received:
    7,744
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Perhaps my thinking about matter is archaic. LOL. I still see matter as depending upon atoms, atoms equal matter. You know, like E=MC2. The M denoting matter. The M referred to atoms, right?

    Could you have a piece of matter one could hold in his hand, without the complete atom? Would a pile of electrons be something I could hold in my hand, and look at it, feel it, weigh it? The only time I could feel just electrons was the time when I stuck my finger in a light socket. LOL.. No offense, just having fun with it.
     
  7. wgabrie

    wgabrie Well-Known Member Donor

    Joined:
    May 31, 2011
    Messages:
    13,830
    Likes Received:
    3,054
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Gender:
    Male
    More good questions that I don't know the answer to. I guess this isn't as cut and dry as I thought. This might still need a lot of work to stitch the electrons together as atoms.
     
  8. One Mind

    One Mind Well-Known Member Past Donor

    Joined:
    Sep 26, 2014
    Messages:
    20,296
    Likes Received:
    7,744
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Perhaps one day we will be able to take energy, and convert it into steel, gold, silver, or any other resource that we ran out of. But we need to start somewhere, and at least in theory we now see such a start with electrons. The problem will probably come with the nucleus of an atom, as we are still finding more and more smaller so called particles that make up the nucleus. With no end in sight. It seems the more we can look, the more we find. LOL.
     
  9. Shiva_TD

    Shiva_TD Progressive Libertarian Past Donor

    Joined:
    Aug 12, 2008
    Messages:
    45,715
    Likes Received:
    885
    Trophy Points:
    113
    We've always known it was possible but the problem is the very high amount of energy required to make even a very small amount of subatomic matter. It is not now nor is it ever likely to be cost effective.
     
  10. Shiva_TD

    Shiva_TD Progressive Libertarian Past Donor

    Joined:
    Aug 12, 2008
    Messages:
    45,715
    Likes Received:
    885
    Trophy Points:
    113
    It's a lot less expensive to mine the asteroid belt or to convert elements into other elements for any elements we might ever need than it is to create matter from energy. Remember that all of the heavy elements in the universe required supernovas to create and a star that explodes represents far more energy than all of the energy on Earth even if the Earth could explode.
     
  11. wgabrie

    wgabrie Well-Known Member Donor

    Joined:
    May 31, 2011
    Messages:
    13,830
    Likes Received:
    3,054
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Gender:
    Male
    Oh, well it sounds to me like they need to invent a lightning rod.
     
  12. wgabrie

    wgabrie Well-Known Member Donor

    Joined:
    May 31, 2011
    Messages:
    13,830
    Likes Received:
    3,054
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Gender:
    Male
    Well, we can look, but at this point we're near the end of possibilities for particles.

    It turns out that quantum mechanics has a strict set of rules that when you fiddle with it you end up wrong very fast.

    Now, most of the particles, regarding spin, have been found. There's a category of 3/2 spin particles we haven't discovered any of them yet, but there are only 8 possibilities there.

    I watched a physics lecture a few days ago. It gave me a new appreciation for how little wiggle room there is left and how close we are to the end. Fair warning, it's long 1 hour 45 minutes, and I realized half way through that it's been dumbed down for the general public and NOT a valid source of information to take to heart. It's still an interesting watch if you're into physics: Quantum Mechanics and Spacetime in the 21st century.
     
  13. wgabrie

    wgabrie Well-Known Member Donor

    Joined:
    May 31, 2011
    Messages:
    13,830
    Likes Received:
    3,054
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Gender:
    Male
    What? Everyone knew about this but me?! I've never heard about it before now.

    I always assumed we'd never discover Energy-to-Matter theory because I was told it requires knowledge of a Unified Field Theory.
     
  14. Prunepicker

    Prunepicker Well-Known Member

    Joined:
    Jun 30, 2014
    Messages:
    6,079
    Likes Received:
    487
    Trophy Points:
    83
    It hasn't happened. The article is very clear that only a suggestion of how
    to turn energy into matter might take place.

    Nothing so far.
     
  15. wgabrie

    wgabrie Well-Known Member Donor

    Joined:
    May 31, 2011
    Messages:
    13,830
    Likes Received:
    3,054
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Gender:
    Male
    Well, yes nothing's been done yet. That's because this just happened, and they still need a particle collider that smashes photons.

    It's coming but it will take some time because we don't have a collider that smashed photons. It's possible, it's just never been done.
     
  16. Prunepicker

    Prunepicker Well-Known Member

    Joined:
    Jun 30, 2014
    Messages:
    6,079
    Likes Received:
    487
    Trophy Points:
    83
    Matter consists of atoms.
     
  17. yguy

    yguy Well-Known Member

    Joined:
    Feb 4, 2010
    Messages:
    18,423
    Likes Received:
    886
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Gender:
    Male
    So neutrons aren't matter?
     
  18. 10A

    10A Chief Deplorable Past Donor

    Joined:
    Jan 10, 2013
    Messages:
    5,698
    Likes Received:
    1,006
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Gender:
    Male
    No, M doesn't stand for matter, it stands for mass. You may choose to say that to be matter, it must have mass.

    Yes atoms do have mass and are matter, but there are many other particles that have mass that aren't atoms. Protons for instance aren't atoms (although you could argue a single proton is an ionized hydrogen atom). Neutrons have mass and aren't atoms. Electrons have mass and aren't atoms. Quarks (in all their forms) , muons, neutrinos, and some bosons have mass....none of them are atoms.

    No you can't hold a pile of electrons on their own. For one, they repel one another electrically so they'd all fly out of your hand (assuming you could get them together somehow). Second, electrons have to obey quantum rules, and the only way to make one stay still is to place it in a very large box so you can't look at it.

    Actually what you felt sticking your finger in the light socket were photons, since they are the carrier of electromagnetic force.
     
  19. 10A

    10A Chief Deplorable Past Donor

    Joined:
    Jan 10, 2013
    Messages:
    5,698
    Likes Received:
    1,006
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Gender:
    Male
    If matter consists of atoms, and atoms consists of protons, neutrons, and electrons, doesn't matter consist of protons, neutrons, and electrons?

    If protons and neutrons consist of quarks, doesn't matter consist of quarks and electrons?
     
  20. Prunepicker

    Prunepicker Well-Known Member

    Joined:
    Jun 30, 2014
    Messages:
    6,079
    Likes Received:
    487
    Trophy Points:
    83
    That wouldn't have been a correct answer to the question which was, "doesn't matter
    need a nucleus and an electron?" The answer is no. Atoms need a nucleus,
    protons and neutrons. Matter needs atoms.
     
  21. Prunepicker

    Prunepicker Well-Known Member

    Joined:
    Jun 30, 2014
    Messages:
    6,079
    Likes Received:
    487
    Trophy Points:
    83
    They, like protons and electrons, are considered particles that make up
    matter.
     
  22. 10A

    10A Chief Deplorable Past Donor

    Joined:
    Jan 10, 2013
    Messages:
    5,698
    Likes Received:
    1,006
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Gender:
    Male
    Not all atoms have protons and neutrons. Hydrogen only has a proton, a single proton with no neutrons in the case of the most common isotope. So a single proton can satisfy the requirement of a nucleus. Is a proton matter?
     
  23. AboveAlpha

    AboveAlpha Well-Known Member

    Joined:
    Jun 20, 2013
    Messages:
    30,284
    Likes Received:
    612
    Trophy Points:
    83
    In Nature Hydrogen tends to exist as H2....that is 2 Atoms of Hydrogen sharing Electron Orbits...2 electrons.

    Matter is both Particles of Mass and Quantum Particle/Wave Forms of Energy but all Particles of Mass such as Protons and Neutrons are comletely comprised of Quantum Particle/Wave Forms thus Matter is completely comprised of Energy upon a Quantum Level.

    AboveAlpha

    - - - Updated - - -

    And Electron is a Particle/Wave Form as it is Quanta.

    AboveAlpha
     
  24. 10A

    10A Chief Deplorable Past Donor

    Joined:
    Jan 10, 2013
    Messages:
    5,698
    Likes Received:
    1,006
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Gender:
    Male
    Gibberish.
     
  25. AboveAlpha

    AboveAlpha Well-Known Member

    Joined:
    Jun 20, 2013
    Messages:
    30,284
    Likes Received:
    612
    Trophy Points:
    83
    Really...and what EXACTLY did I post that was Gibberish?

    AboveAlpha
     

Share This Page