1/3/2024 0 Comments Antimatter light spectrum![]() Physicists have believed that the universe is made of both matter and. "Now we just push forward to make it more and more accurate. New insight into elusive antimatter can help unravel universe’s mysteries iStock. "We are now in the business of doing antimatter spectroscopy," Hangst told LiveScience. After the excited positron jumps to a higher orbit, it will fall back and emit the extra energy as light, and scientists will measure the light's frequency. This is the first step toward applying a detailed method of measurement called spectroscopy, which involves tuning the light to a very specific frequency so that it can excite the antiatom's positron to a higher energy level, or orbit. The experiment proves it's possible to change an antiatom's internal properties by shining a light on it. "Precision-wise, it doesn't compete with matter, but it's the only one that's ever been done on antimatter." "We have made a measurement," said Jeffrey Hangst of Denmark's Aarhus University, spokesman for the CERN laboratory's ALPHA experiment. When it collides with an atom in the wall, the antiatom is annihilated along with the atom, creating a signature that the physicists are able to detect. The antiatom is free to fly off and hit the walls of its trap, which are made of matter. This causes the particle's magnetic orientation to change, and the magnetic trap that held it no longer works. When the electrons move from one orbit to another they absorb or emit light at specific wavelengths, forming the atom's spectrum. In the new research, physicists found they could beam microwave light of a specific frequency at an antihydrogen atom, flipping its spin. The ALPHA collaboration reports in Nature the first ever measurement on the optical spectrum of an antimatter atom.
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