反物质及其可能的应用

近年来对反物质的深入研究以及对反物质产生、收集和储存等技术不断发展，使得反物质进入军事应用领域的可能性增大．文章对反物质的几个可能的应用领域进行了介绍，并分析了反物质对核军备控制的影响．     

反物质的存在及反氢的制造

本文阐述了人类寻找反物质的历程；目前产生反氢原子的方法及利用反物质的美好前景。     

反物质与反氢原子

 1996年1月,欧洲核子研究中心庆祝在一次实验中合成了11个反氢原子,人类第一次真正看到了反物质原子.1996年底,美国报道位于美国伊利诺州巴达维亚的费米国家实验室也制成了7个反氢原子.反氢原子的制造成功打开了反物质研究的大门.     

反粒子·反物质·反物质武器

 反粒子的发现是现代物理学的一项重大成就。在微观物理研究领域,每个粒子都存在着它的反粒子。据此,人们推测在宏观或宇观世界,应存在着由反质子、反中子和正电子构成的反物质。下面简要介绍反粒子、反物质与反物质武器的有关问题。一、反粒子1928年,英国理论物理学家狄拉克（PaulAdri-enMauriceDirac,1902～1984）提出了一个关于电子运动的相对论性量子力学理论,建立了著名的狄拉克方程。     

对反物质进行光谱测量的实验进展

 激光被首次用来成功制造出反氢原子,这样就可以对反物质原子进行精确的光谱测量。哲学家威廉·詹姆斯说过:“如果你想推翻所有乌鸦都是黑的这个论断,那么不必证明它们都不是黑的,只要你找出一只白乌鸦就足够了。”同样,如果你想检验所谓的CPT定理--根据CPT定理,一个由反物质构成的世界其行为与一个由物质构成的世界完全相同,所以你也不必制造出整个“反物质世界”。只要能够证明反原子有一次发生跃迁的频率值与相应的原子在同样的跃迁中频率值不同,证据就非常足够充分了。     

反质子间相互作用的研究

随着对反物质研究的深入,人们需要迫切知道反质子之间的相互作用力是怎样的,是否与质子之间的作用是对称的。对这个作用力的测量,有助于我们理解反物质原子核的形成机制以及对物质-反物质对称性的理解。为此,STAR合作组利用相对论重离子加速器中金核-金核碰撞中产生的丰富的反质子,通过反质子-反质子动量关联函数的测量,并扣除了通过其他粒子衰变过来的次级反质子与其他反粒子关联的污染,精确地构建了反质子-反质子关联函数。然后,结合量子多粒子关联理论,定量提取出反质子-反质子的有效力程和散射长度这两个基本作用参数。研究表明,在实验精度内,反质子间的相互作用与正质子保持一致。反质子-反质子之间的强相互作用存在着吸引,它们可以克服由于同号（负电荷）的反质子-反质子之间的库仑排斥而结合成反物质原子核。这项研究首次实现了对反物质间相互作用力的测量,为进一步研究反原子核的形成和属性奠定了基础。同时为CPT对称性的检验提供了一种新的方式,对人类深刻认识物质世界的构成及其运动规律具有重要意义。With undergoing researches on antimatter physics, it is crucial to understand what the interaction between antiprotons is. Is it the same as the interaction between protons? This measurement will definitely help us to understand the formation mechanism of antimatter nuclei as well as the symmetry of matter and antimatter. In this context, our STAR collaboration measured the correlation function of antiproton-antiproton pairs from 200 GeV/c Au+Au collisions. After substracting the residual correlation due to the secondary antiprotons that decayed from other particles, the primary antiproton-antiproton correlation function is extracted. By applying the quantum theory of multi-particle correlation, two key parameters that characterize the corresponding strong interaction:namely, the scattering length (f₀) and effective range (d₀) were obtained. Within error bars, it is found that the f₀ and d₀ for the antiproton-antiproton interaction are consistent with their antiparticle counterparts -the ones for the proton-proton interaction. Like the force that holds ordinary protons together within the nuclei of atoms, the force between antiprotons is attractive and strong, which overcomes the tendency of the like (negatively) charged particles to repel one another, and allows the antiprotons to bind to form antinucleus. The current measurement is for the first time to measure the interaction between antimatter, it offers a foundation to understanding the structure of more-complex antinuclei and their properties. Also our measurement offers a new way to test the CPT symmetry, which has an important impact for human beings to understand the law of motion in our world.     

基于正电子的反物质研究进展

正电子是最容易获得的反粒子,因而电子-正电子系统最适合研究普通物质与反物质的结合.本文结合最近实验上首次合成物质-反物质分子这个重大发现,介绍反物质(正电子)研究历史、现状及展望;重点讨论基于正电子的捕获、约束、积累等实验技术,以及物质-反物质分子--正电子素分子的合成方法.     

重子物质与反重子暗物质统一的起源

美国和加拿大的物理学家提出一种新粒子可以解决现代物理的两个重要疑难问题:暗物质是什么以及为什么宇宙中的物质远比反物质多?预计这种有待发现的粒子主要衰变成正物质,而其反粒子主要衰变成隐藏的反物质.研究人员声称,这种粒子在早期宇宙中的存在可以说明为何宇宙中物质比反物质多,以及暗物质实际上是隐藏的反物质.     

基于正电子的反物质研究进展

正电子是最容易获得的反粒子,因而电子-正电子系统最适合研究普通物质与反物质的结合。本文结合最近实验上首次合成物质-反物质分子这个重大发现,介绍反物质(正电子)研究历史、现状及展望;重点讨论基于正电子的捕获、约束、积累等实验技术,以及物质-反物质分子——正电子素分子的合成方法。     

费米实验室探测到物质与反物质之间的跃迁

宇宙学家相信，在大爆炸过程中产生的物质与反物质是等量的．但是如果物质与反物质粒子是彼此严格相反的，那么它们将已经湮灭而只剩下光子了．这种情况并没有发生，这就是为什么宇宙中的物质比反物质多的多．     

Cold and stable antimatter for fundamental physics

The field of cold antimatter physics has rapidly developed in the last 20 years, overlapping with the period of the Antiproton Decelerator (AD) at CERN. The central subjects are CPT symmetry tests and Weak Equivalence Principle (WEP) tests. Various groundbreaking techniques have been developed and are still in progress such as to cool antiprotons and positrons down to extremely low temperature, to manipulate antihydrogen atoms, to construct extremely high-precision Penning traps, etc. The precisions of the antiproton and proton magnetic moments have improved by six orders of magnitude, and also laser spectroscopy of antihydrogen has been realized and reached a relative precision of 2 × 10⁻¹² during the AD time. Antiprotonic helium laser spectroscopy, which started during the Low Energy Antiproton Ring (LEAR) time, has reached a relative precision of 8 × 10⁻¹⁰. Three collaborations joined the WEP tests inventing various unique approaches. An additional new post-decelerator, Extra Low ENergy Antiproton ring (ELENA), has been constructed and will be ready in 2021, which will provide 10–100 times more cold antiprotons to each experiment. A new era of the cold antimatter physics will emerge soon including the transport of antiprotons to other facilities.     

Quark deconfinement in antiproton annihilation at rest on light nuclei

The production of low-energy antimatter provides unique opportunities to search for new physics in an unexplored regime. Testing gravitational interactions with antimatter is one such opportunity. Here a scenario based on Lorentz and CPT violation in the Standard-Model Extension is considered in which anomalous gravitational effects in antimatter could arise.     

Antimatter in the Universe

Cosmological models which predict a large amount of antimatter in the Universe are reviewed. Observational signatures and searches for cosmic antimatter are briefly considered. A short discussion of new long range forces which might be associated with matter and antimatter is presented.     

Anti-helium flux as a signature for antimatter globular clusters in our Galaxy

The Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer experiment is shown to be sensitive to test the hypothesis on the existence of antimatter globular cluster in our Galaxy. The hypothesis follows from the analysis of possible tests for the mechanisms of baryosynthesis and uses antimatter domains in the matter-dominated Universe as the probe for the physics underlying the origin of matter. The interval of masses for the antimatter in our Galaxy is fixed from below by the condition of antimatter domain survival in the matter-dominated Universe and from above by the observed gamma-ray flux. For this interval, the expected fluxes of anti-helium-3 and anti-helium-4 are calculated with account for their interaction with the matter in the Galaxy.     

What Would Be Outcome of a Big Crunch?

I suggest the existence of a still undiscovered interaction: repulsion between matter and antimatter. The simplest and the most elegant candidate for such a force is gravitational repulsion between matter and antimatter. I argue that such a force may give birth to a new Universe; by transforming an eventual Big Crunch of our Universe, to an event similar to Big Bang. In fact, when a collapsing Universe is reduced to a supermassive black hole of a small size, a very strong field of the conjectured force may create particle-antiparticle pairs from the surrounding quantum vacuum. The amount of antimatter created from the physical vacuum is equal to the decrease of mass of “black hole Universe” and violently repelled from it. When the size of the black hole is sufficiently small, the creation of antimatter may become so huge and fast, that matter of our Universe may disappear in a fraction of the Planck time. So fast transformation of matter to antimatter may look like a Big Bang with initial size about 30 orders of magnitude greater than the Planck length, questioning the need for inflation. In addition, a Big Crunch, of a Universe dominated by matter, leads to a new Universe dominated by antimatter, and vice versa; without need to invoke CP violation as explanation of matter-antimatter asymmetry. Simply, our present day Universe is dominated by matter, because the previous Universe was dominated by antimatter.     

Antimatter in the universe

The models leading to a high abundance of antimatter in the universe are discussed. Special attention is payed to the model of antimatter creation in the form of compact stellar-like objects. Such objects can contribute significantly to the cosmological dark matter. Observational signatures of antimatter in the Galaxy are discussed.     

Antimatter and cosmology

This paper discusses two aspects of antimatter and cosmology: (1) the fundamental cosmological question as to whether antimatter plays an equally important role as matter in the universe (overall baryon symmetry), and (2) cosmic-ray antimatter tests for the nature of the dark matter in the universe.     

Antiproton annihilation in the galaxy as a source of diffuse γ background

A model is developed for antimatter loss by a globular cluster of antimatter stars and its annihilation with a gas of ordinary matter. The flux of photons produced in proton-antiproton annihilation is shown to reproduce the observed γ background measured by the EGRET telescope. The maximum possible number of antimatter stars presumably existing in the Milky Way Galaxy is estimated on the basis of a comparison with observational data.