- #1
sanman
- 745
- 24
There's a theory being proposed that the reason for the expansion of the universe is because of the mutual repulsion of matter and anti-matter, in what is essentially anti-gravity:
http://www.universetoday.com/84934/...-dark-energy-as-cause-of-universes-expansion/
So just as a thought experiment - what if this was true? What if matter and anti-matter repel each other in what amounts to an anti-gravitational force?
Would there be any way to usefully harness this for propulsion purposes?
Could you make some kind of gravitational catapult from matter-antimatter repulsion?
Unlike EM force, whose influence falls off very quickly beyond short distances, your gravitational catapult would sustain its accelerative effect on you over a vast span of distance.
If your rocket is made of matter, and somehow has an equal mass of anti-matter attached to it, then is it effectively "gravitationally neutral"? (ie. like "buoyancy neutral")
Could you hover near the event-horizon of a black hole without too much effort, like in the Disney movie?
So just as conventional objects made of matter will fall downwards towards Earth, then would objects made of anti-matter "fall upwards"? (ie. away from our matter-based planet)
And just as another hypothetical speculation, what if this means that there are large islands of anti-matter waiting for us outside our galaxy? I know it sounds pie-in-the-sky to talk about traveling outside our galaxy, but how could we safely do so if we're in danger of running into some anti-matter and getting annihilated by it?
Also, if there are entire galaxies and solar systems out there composed of anti-matter, then could these potentially generate "anti-life" (ie. life composed of anti-matter)?
How do you communicate with life made of anti-matter?
These days we have BECs and atom lasers, which are supposed to be able to measure gravitational effects with great sensitivity while self-shielding from charge effects. I'd read that recently for the first time, a BEC had been briefly created from anti-hydrogen.
Since hydrogen and anti-hydrogen are each overall charge-neutral, that could help in focusing measurement on the gravitational behavior of anti-matter wrt to matter.
(This sounds like a job for some topnotch national lab to attempt such an experiment, using antimatter, BECs and high vacuum.)
If BECs and atom lasers already allow us to manipulate apparent mass properties using wave mechanics, and if we can apply these principles to matter-antimatter repulsive interactions, then couldn't similarly manipulate gravity/spacetime?
http://www.universetoday.com/84934/...-dark-energy-as-cause-of-universes-expansion/
So just as a thought experiment - what if this was true? What if matter and anti-matter repel each other in what amounts to an anti-gravitational force?
Would there be any way to usefully harness this for propulsion purposes?
Could you make some kind of gravitational catapult from matter-antimatter repulsion?
Unlike EM force, whose influence falls off very quickly beyond short distances, your gravitational catapult would sustain its accelerative effect on you over a vast span of distance.
If your rocket is made of matter, and somehow has an equal mass of anti-matter attached to it, then is it effectively "gravitationally neutral"? (ie. like "buoyancy neutral")
Could you hover near the event-horizon of a black hole without too much effort, like in the Disney movie?
So just as conventional objects made of matter will fall downwards towards Earth, then would objects made of anti-matter "fall upwards"? (ie. away from our matter-based planet)
And just as another hypothetical speculation, what if this means that there are large islands of anti-matter waiting for us outside our galaxy? I know it sounds pie-in-the-sky to talk about traveling outside our galaxy, but how could we safely do so if we're in danger of running into some anti-matter and getting annihilated by it?
Also, if there are entire galaxies and solar systems out there composed of anti-matter, then could these potentially generate "anti-life" (ie. life composed of anti-matter)?
How do you communicate with life made of anti-matter?
These days we have BECs and atom lasers, which are supposed to be able to measure gravitational effects with great sensitivity while self-shielding from charge effects. I'd read that recently for the first time, a BEC had been briefly created from anti-hydrogen.
Since hydrogen and anti-hydrogen are each overall charge-neutral, that could help in focusing measurement on the gravitational behavior of anti-matter wrt to matter.
(This sounds like a job for some topnotch national lab to attempt such an experiment, using antimatter, BECs and high vacuum.)
If BECs and atom lasers already allow us to manipulate apparent mass properties using wave mechanics, and if we can apply these principles to matter-antimatter repulsive interactions, then couldn't similarly manipulate gravity/spacetime?