Anti-Matter DOOM!

I have fallen radically behind on my conceptions in regards to anti-matter. My brain was still stuck back in the dark ages of thinking this shit was theoretical. Well it not only is not theoretical but it is being produced in labs by the billions! And that's just one load...

Billions of particles of anti-matter created in laboratory

Take a gold sample the size of the head of a push pin, shoot a laser through it, and suddenly more than 100 billion particles of anti-matter appear.

The anti-matter, also known as positrons, shoots out of the target in a cone-shaped plasma “jet.”

This new ability to create a large number of positrons in a small laboratory opens the door to several fresh avenues of anti-matter research, including an understanding of the physics underlying various astrophysical phenomena such as black holes and gamma ray bursts.

At least that's what the government keeps telling the scientists that it will be used for. They have no intention of pointing this thing at a secret alien moon base. But I digress.

In the experiment, the laser ionizes and accelerates electrons, which are driven right through the gold target. On their way, the electrons interact with the gold nuclei, which serve as a catalyst to create positrons. The electrons give off packets of pure energy, which decays into matter and anti-matter, following the predictions by Einstein’s famous equation that relates matter and energy. By concentrating the energy in space and time, the laser produces positrons more rapidly and in greater density than ever before in the laboratory.

The equipment that makes this possible is the petawatt laser in Austin, Texas.

Hailed as "the highest powered laser in the world" by Todd Ditmire, a physicist at the University of Texas at Austin, the device has the "power output of more than 2,000 times the output of all power plants in the United States," and in case that wasn't impressive enough, it's also "brighter than sunlight on the surface of the sun" -- but alas, only for a tenth of a trillionth of a second. Aside from totally ganking the geeky gloating rights from the Wolverines, the Longhorns will use the laser to study astronomical phenomena in miniature (and probably take over the world in short order).

I knew it! They are planning on taking over the world.

For all you folks who were expecting certain doom at the hands of the LHC only to be told you have to wait until next summer, just remember that a handful of Texans have the most powerful laser in the world and are using it to produce large quantities of anti-matter and no I have not been reading comic books, just the news, which is far more creative these days.

All of a sudden I find myself in love with the world.